RIO DE JANEIRO CAMPAIGN 433 
building in the city, destroyed the early stages of mosquitoes, and abolished or 
screened standing water where possible. One force worked in buildings, and 
another in vacant lots, streams, marsh lands, etc. The following paragraphs 
relative to this work are quoted from an address made by Doctor Oswaldo Cruz 
before the Latin-American Medical and Sanitary Congress held in Rio de 
Janeiro, August 1 to 10, 1909. 
“Yellow-fever cases were made known to the sanitary inspectors by the 
reports of medical assistants, of the head of the family in which a case occurred, 
or by any one to whom the facts of the case were known, in accordance with the 
requirements of the law. The sanitary service being advised, a competent group 
of inspectors and authorities were at once dispatched to the locality, having with 
them a physician. The latter ascertained if the case was one for isolation treat- 
ment (whether under or over four days after the onset of the disease), and if 
the case required isolation the same was carried out either in the dwelling house 
or in the hospital, hospital treatment being resorted to only when the dwelling 
was unsuited to isolation treatment or when the patient wished it. In such cases 
the patient was taken to hospital in a vehicle closed against the entrance of mos- 
quitoes and the house was disinfected in accordance with the system below out- 
lined. In the case of isolation in the home the physician chose a roomy quarter 
of the house with door opening into another secluded part of the house and with 
windows. If there were more than one door, the others were temporarily closed. 
The patient was kept under a netting enveloping the bed upon which he lay 
during the time permanent quarters were being arranged. The doors and win- 
dows of the room to be isolated and of the rest of the house as well were sealed 
to prevent the exit of mosquitoes existing there, the windows of the isolated 
room being fitted with wire screens in such a way as not to interfere with ventila- 
tion, all other openings to the outside or to other parts of the house being sealed 
with cloth or paper. The only door to be used in the use of the room must be 
specially fitted with a double door drum, provided with an arrangement which 
does not permit of both doors being opened at the same time. This apparatus 
prevents the entrance and exit of mosquitoes, and after the room is thus prepared 
the door and windows are closed and camomile is burned in the room 3 to 4 hours 
in the proportion of 10 grams per cubic meter of space. The room is then well 
ventilated and is ready to receive the patient. The rest of the house is well 
calked and isolated from the room in which the patient is placed and disinfected 
with sulphur gas, as below indicated. During this operation a sanitary inspector 
remains in the room with the patient and stops the entrance of any gas which 
may possibly find its way through some overlooked crevice. During the prepa- 
ration for disinfection the sanitary authorities make a thorough inspection and 
destroy any mosquito larva they find, pick up or destroy any vessels lying about 
which might serve as a receptacle for mosquito-breeding water and close water 
boxes against the same danger. The patient remains in isolation for seven days, 
after which isolation may terminate, if the family so wishes. The infected 
district is then treated as above indicated; that is, by disinfection, sanitary 
policing, and medical supervision. Disinfection is carred on in two ways, one 
force working from the center toward the outer limits of the district and the 
other from the boundaries of the district inward. The area of infection being 
determined over as large an area as possible, these two sections separate, one of 
which begins immediately with the house in which the case of yellow fever 
occurred, the other beginning at those houses which might possibly have been in- 
fected at the greatest possible distance from the case in isolation. The purpose 
