^mAp°r?Ci9Hrm'}  United  States  Public  Health  Service.  155 
THE  UNITED  STATES  PUBLIC  HEALTH  SERVICE.1 
By  John  F.  Anderson,  Director  Hygienic  Laboratory,  U.  S.  Public  Health 
Service,  Washington,  D.  C. 
The  Federal  Public  Health  Service  is  a  bureau  of  the  Treasury 
Department.  Beginning-  as  the  Marine  Hospital  Service,  through 
successive  acts  of  Congress  it  has  undergone  a  process  of  evolution 
so  that  all  of  its  duties  are  essentially  of  a  public  health  character, 
and  it  is  organized  with  a  view  to  their  performance. 
The  central  bureau  at  Washington,  which  is  presided  over  by 
the  surgeon-general,  has  seven  divisions,  as  follows : 
1.  Personnel  and  accounts. 
2.  Foreign  and  insular  quarantine  and  immigration. 
3.  Domestic  (interstate)  quarantine  and  sanitation. 
4.  Sanitary  reports  and  statistics. 
5.  Scientific  research. 
6.  Marine  hospitals  and  relief. 
7.  Miscellaneous. 
Each  of  the  six  divisions  first  mentioned  is  in  charge  of  an 
assistant  surgeon-general,  who  is  directly  responsible  for  administra- 
tive matters  in  connection  with  his  division.  The  officer  who'  has 
charge  of  the  Division  of  Personnel  and  Accounts  has  immediate 
supervision  of  the  entire  personnel  and  appropriations,  and  the 
preparation  of  the  annual  estimates  therefor. 
Through  the  Division  of  Foreign  and  Insular  Quarantine  and 
Immigration  are  administered  all  matters  relating  to  maritime  quar- 
antine and  medical  inspections  of  aliens. 
Through  the  Division  of  Interstate  Quarantine  are  administered 
all  matters  relating  to  the  control  of  contagious  and  infectious  dis- 
eases in  interstate  traffic. 
The  Division  of  Sanitary  Reports  and  Statistics  handles  all 
matters  relating  to  the  collection  of  morbidity  reports,  reports  of 
epidemics,  and  of  information  pertaining  to  the  geographic  distri- 
bution of  disease  and  to  climate  in  relation  to>  health  and  disease. 
The  Division  of  Scientific  Research  administers  all  matters  re- 
lating to*  investigations  of  contagious  and  infectious  diseases  and 
1  Abstract  of  a  lecture  delivered  by  invitation  March  9,  1914,  before  the 
Philadelphia  College  of  Pharmacy. 
