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THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



be a 'decrease in the great white plague. 

 When all is said and done, the cure and 

 prevention of this disease lies in the full 

 dinner-pail and all that goes with it, and 

 coincident with the rise in wages and the 

 increase in employment there will be an 

 increase in food, and an improvement in 

 housing, clothing, and all of the other 

 things which tend to counteract the mis- 

 eries of human life. 



The energetic campaign which is being 

 waged in cooperation with the strictly 

 military authorities against those insidi- 

 ous social diseases whose occurrence is 

 such a threat against organized society 

 and the successful conclusion of the war 

 deserves a word. 



COMBATING INSIDIOUS SOCIAL DISEASES 



Suffice it to say. that through the ad- 

 ministration of the vice law by the War 

 Department and the frank education of 

 the general public by the Public Health 

 Service, much is being accomplished. 

 This problem is being handled solely on 

 the basis of the prevention of the spread 

 of communicable disease. 



When it is realized that the diseases 

 comprising this group are largely spread 

 by chronic carriers, and that contact, 

 either direct or remote, is the method by 

 which this spread occurs, it is realized 

 that there need be no more hesitancy in 

 frankly combating them than obtains in 

 the case of the other diseases which are 

 spread by contact ; for example, small- 

 pox, which, terrible as it is, does not even 

 remotely approach the disastrous effects 

 which the social evil works on the pres- 

 ent generation as well as those yet un- 

 born. Dispensaries are being established 

 for the cure of civilians who have these 

 diseases and are therefore potential dis- 

 tributors of them. 



Healthful recreations are being pro- 

 vided by the War Department to coun- 

 teract the allurements of vice. The gen- 

 eral public in the extra-cantonment zones 

 is being organized in an attempt to con- 

 trol the spread of these entirely prevent- 

 able diseases. Some of this work is 

 being done entirely by the War Depart- 

 ment : some entirely by the Public Health 

 Service, and all of it is being done in 

 complete and close cooperation between 

 the two departments. That there is great 



need for this work there can be no doubt; 

 that it will do great good is equally true. 



BETTER NATIONAL HEALTH A BY-PRODUCT 

 OF THE WAR 



One thing is certain, the work which 

 is now going on is building permanently 

 for a better public health. It is laying the 

 foundations for an improvement in com- 

 munity conditions which we have every 

 reason to believe will gradually spread 

 throughout the United States. In each 

 of the places in which the Public Health 

 Service is now conducting its operations 

 a strong and enduring health machine is 

 being built up. Just as soon as the local 

 community will take this over, it will be 

 transferred. The model morbidity regis- 

 tration areas will, it is hoped, gradually 

 expand peripherally, until by the meet- 

 ing of their borders they will coalesce 

 and we will have in America a system 

 for the collection of disease data, the 

 like of which the world has never seen. 



This campaign means much more than 

 the present protection of the public 

 health. It is a gigantic demonstration of 

 what can be accomplished in the pre- 

 vention of disease. Just as the work 

 which was done in the control of malaria 

 at Panama set a standard for all the 

 world, so the present operations will lead 

 to sanitary campaigns in zones which at 

 present are only rather remotelv con- 

 cerned with the war movement. 



In the areas in which the government 

 is now conducting this wholesale on- 

 slaught on communicable disease there 

 will be a lowering in the sickness rate, a 

 decrease in the number of deaths, an im- 

 provement in the efficiency of the whole 

 community, with a consequent added 

 prosperity. Results such as these can be 

 obtained at any place in the world in 

 which the people and their health guard- 

 ians are willing to work actively and in- 

 telligently. 



One thing this war has taught us : men 

 are not so cheap as we once thought 

 them. Human life and human efficiency 

 are the two most precious things on earth. 

 If out of this awful labor of war a strong 

 public health sentiment for the entire na- 

 tion can be born, then will our sacrifices 

 not have been in vain. 



