CONGRESS ON TUBERCULOSIS. 
455 
According to the business report of the German Central 
Committee for the Establishment of Sanatoria for the Cure of 
Consumptives, about 5500 beds will be at the disposal of these 
institutions by the end of 1901, and then, if we assume'that the 
average stay of each patient will be three months, it will be 
possible to treat at least 20,000 patients every year. From the 
reports hitherto issued as to the results that have been achieved 
in the establishments we learn further that about 20 per cent, of 
the patients that have tubercle-bacilli in their sputum lose them 
by the treatment there. This is the only sure test of success, 
especially as regards prophylaxis. If we make this the basis of 
our estimates, we find that 4000 consumptives will leave these 
establishments annually as cured. But, according to the statis¬ 
tics ascertained by the German Imperial Office of Health, there 
are 226,000 persons in Germany over fifteen years of age who 
are so far gone in consumption that hospital treatment is neces¬ 
sary for them. Compared with this great number of consump¬ 
tives the success of the establishments in question seems so 
small that a material influence on the retrogression of tubercu¬ 
losis in general is not yet to be expected of them. But pray do 
not imagine that I wish, by this calculation of mine, to oppose 
the movement for the establishment of such sanatoria in any way, 
I only wish to warn against the over-estimating of their impor¬ 
tance which has recently been observable in various quarters, 
based apparently on the opinion that the war against tubercu¬ 
losis can be waged by means of sanatoria alone, and that other 
measures are of subordinate value. In reality the contrary is 
the case. What is to be achieved by the general prophylaxis 
resulting from recognition of the danger of infection and the 
consequent greater caution in intercourse with consumptives 
is shown by a calculation of Cornet’s regarding the decrease of 
mortality from tuberculosis in Prussia in the years 1889 to 
1897. Before 1889 the average was 31.4 per 10,000, whereas 
in the period named it sank to 21.8, which means that, in that 
short space of time, the number of deaths from tuberculosis was 
184,000 less than was to be expected from the average of the 
preceding years. In New York, under the influence of the gen¬ 
eral sanitary measures directed in a simply exemplary manner 
by Beggs, the mortality from tuberculosis has diminished by 
more than 35 per cent, since 1886. And it must be remembered 
that both in Prussia and New York the progress indicated by 
these figures is due to the first beginnings of these measures. 
Considerably greater success is to be expected of their further 
