The Importance of Hygiene by J. R. Leadsworth, M.D.

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Mountain View, California · Jun 17, 1908

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 34, No. 25.

The Importance of Hygiene.

By J. R. Leadsworth, M.D.

OF WHAT importance is the study of hygiene? It has not been many years since a practising physician and member of a board of health in a prominent American city defined the subject as meaning muddy or bad-smelling water. Now even the most unsophisticated school-boy knows that it is a subject that has to do with healthful surroundings and healthful food and drink. To-day the hygienic department sends its sanitary officer ahead of the explorer or the civil engineer, and the most miasmic country becomes habitable,—in some instances a home for the health-seeker. Dr. Metchinkoff, the French scientist, has truly said that while “therapeutics has gained most important victories, yet to hygiene belongs, without a doubt, the place of honor in modern medicine.”

Concrete Examples.

The island of Cuba was a hot-bed of yellow fever previous to American occupancy. But in sixteen months of rigid enforcement of sanitary laws, the island was thoroly rid of that dread disease.

Largely on account of the deadly effects of yellow fever and malaria on the canal zone, the French, after expending millions on the project, were compelled to abandon work. But with a well-organized department of hygiene in charge, and with power to enforce its measures, the most fatal diseases, malaria and yellow fever, diseases which decimated the working forces on the canal heretofore, are almost entirely eliminated from the category of diseases in that belt. In a recent report from Colonel Gorges, head of the health department, he stated that “among 6,000 Americans in the employ of the commission, including some 1,200 American women and children, the families of these employees, we have but little sickness of any kind, and their general appearance is fully as vigorous and robust as that of the same number of people in the United States.”

Notwithstanding the fact that discoveries in this line have robbed many diseases of their terrors, still the study of hygiene and immunity offers a wide field of research.

Tuberculosis.

Only a few years ago, tuberculosis was considered among the incurable diseases, and being once contracted by an individual, calculations were made as to whether it was quick consumption or the more chronic form. In either event, it was assumed that it would end fatally. To-day many persons are well and strong who, some years previous, gave unmistakable evidence of being afflicted with this loathsome disease. The most approved diagnostic method fails to show any remote effect of the disease left upon their system, and all this has come about, not by tuberculin injections, not by swallowing some mysterious compound, not by visiting some famous springs where healing comes without change of habits but in coming back to long-neglected, simple, hygienic living.

In a recent paper on this subject, Dr. Senn of Chicago gave expression to these significant words: “The clientele of the physicians is growing smaller and smaller, but their glory as humanitarians and scientists is rising and will reach the zenith after coming generations of more erudite physicians have conquered and laid at their feet the two worst enemies of mankind—tuberculosis and cancer. We are confident that tuberculosis in all its forms will soon be forced to retreat, as we know its microbic cause and are familiar with its methods of work. We have learned by long experience that the most formidable weapons in fighting this disease are not drugs but pure air, sunshine, and nutritious, easily-digested food.”

The Simple Life.

Many people get well by dropping business cares, and artificial life incident thereto, by going to Florida or to California, but the great mass of the afflicted have not the means with which to afford such luxuries. But quite a proportion of these last named have found that health may be found in the sunshine and air and earth that is so abundant around every home. And, usually, it is had just as freely when the same conditions are applied at home as are made use of in taking a vacation in California or Arizona.

Sir Frederick Treves, Court Physician, and one of the most eminent physicians and surgeons in England, recently gave utterance to some statements that seem incredible to one who has heretofore trusted in the mysterious power of drugs as against hygienic measures. He said he believed that “the time will come when hospitals for infectious diseases will be empty and not wanted. This is to be accomplished by hygiene. The mystery of the ancient doctor, his long words and extraordinary prescription, is passing away. The multitude of shelves of bottles which surround him is also passing away and being replaced by simple living, suitable diet and plenty of sun and fresh air.” Dr. Treves looks forward to the time “when people will leave off the extraordinary habit of taking medicine when they are sick and when it will be found as anomalous for persons to die of scarlet fever, typhoid, cholera, or diphtheria as for a man to die of a wolf’s bite in England.”

Headache and Diet.

A few years ago, it would have been looked upon as an excuse for ignorance to recommend hygienic precautions for the cure of headache. In a recent number of the London Lancet, Dr. Harris, writing at length upon the cause and treatment of periodical headache, devotes considerable space to the effect of diet upon the various forms of this frequent malady, and ends his article with the following significant paragraph: “Lastly, the effect of an open-air life has scarcely received sufficient prominence in the treatment of many forms of toxemic headache. Persons who are subject to chronic headaches should cultivate the habit of keeping their windows widely open, and the hardening process thus slowly applied will not only render the individual far less susceptible to catching ordinary colds, but his tendency to frequent headaches will often disappear, and from a listless valetudinarian with always something wrong with him, he will become brisk and healthy in mind and body.”