YELLOW FEVER 169 



everything contained in the sick room, are the best 

 prophylactic measures to be employed. 



Measles, mumps, and whooping cough are all 

 infectious diseases of childhood of unknown origin. 

 In family life isolation is rarely enforced, as the 

 diseases are so highly contagious that room quaran- 

 tine is not usually effective. In hospitals, where 

 better facilities for isolation are found, rigid quaran- 

 tine is always observed. 



Yellow Fever 



Yellow fever is an infectious fever characterized 

 by a high temperature, great prostration, vomiting 

 of mucus, followed by bile (" black vomit "), dimin- 

 ished secretion of urine, and albuminuria. The fa- 

 talities are very high, ranging from 35 per cent to 

 99 per cent in different epidemics. 



The disease is endemic in the West Indies, in 

 Brazil, and in West Africa, from which it is sometimes 

 carried into neighboring countries, resulting in ter- 

 rible epidemics which are only controlled by the 

 advent of frost. 



No organism has yet been proven to be the cause 

 of yellow fever, although there seems to be no doubt 

 that the disease is due to an ultra-microscopic germ 

 which is contained in the blood of the infected person. 



