HEALTH COLUMN.

Otago Witness, Issue 1906, 21 August 1890, Page 41

HEALTH COLUMN.

I Dangers of Promiscuous Kissing. , i Kissing is an objectionable form of greeting, a powerful medium for communicating disease, and a menace to the health of the community. It is unwise to be over-fastidious, but as medical science, in its progress for the better, detects errors in our habits and customs, we should yield to the prestige of incontrovertible fact. Lives are daily sacrificed, and diseases daily communicated, by the promiscuous babit of kissing. As a custom it is baneful, and women should frown it down in the home circle, and abandon it as a form of greeting. Though possibly not a direful, it is certainly a dangerous form of welcome. Any person with rough or sore lips is not kissable. Remember that and be warned. Sore lips, coated tongue, and ulcerated mouth usually go together, and all are indicative of a diseased stomach. Something is wrong when the membrane of the lips is not smooth as a petal and red as a rose. Even that is j not always a sure sign of health, for a person may be wasting away with disease and still have the appearance of being well. Friendship can make itself felt in other ways equally well, such as a bunch of flowers. To kiss the mouth of disease is rash ; to kiss the lips of death is foolhardy. The mother in many cases carries from the j sick room the contagion that prostrates her j entire family. Quarantine in the house is as essential to security as it is among nations, and the mother who from choice or neses- j sity nurses the little one stricken down with diphtheria or pneumonia should have no communications whatever with the other members of her farajly. In the sacred precincts of the fireside, whe < re death has laid its relentless hand on one' of its members, the common practice of kissing is liable to induce septicaemia, and thus other precious lives are exposed to the venomous sting. As you can see more easily the aotion of a drug when given in a large dope, so you will see more pointedly the. danger arising from kissing, by giving an illustration of a malignant disease. There is no longer any doubt in regard to the inoculability and infectiousness of consumption. When you take intoconsidera- | tion the fact that more die by its insidious hands than by any other form of disease, but few families can be exempt from it. This being the case, as proven by the medical records, should not persons visiting 6uch unfortunate individuals do away with the accustomed mode of salutation ? A disease which has resisted the treatment of the most, skilful students up to the present day should be prevented, if possible, by discretion. As the conventionalities now stand approved, human life ami physical welfare are daily sacrificed by people foolish enough to conform to the custom. Change the custom,' and other styles of greeting will soon become popular, and they will be much more sensible and safe. The bacillus of phthisis is a minute form of organic life which acts so subtilely that the introduction of it into the system wouldnot be manifested by any immediate symptoms,- but as surely as"a little leaven leaveheth ' the : whole lump," just' so sufely will the microscopical germs raaltiply in the system in a most marvellous manner. 1 Soon there will be a hackicg cough, some elevation -of the temperature, hoarseness.or riollow>< voice,' and the work of destruction.' goes on until the victim can no longer- resist Us invasion, and death claims the victory! There are other maladies even more dreadful whioh the afflicted person! can; by kissing another fn perfect health/ Qommuriieate. ', Oity andiOountby. — There is practically no disease, with the exception of typhoid and malarial fevers, which does Dot claim a larger number of deaths in the large cities than in the" country— i. <?., smaller towns, villages, and sparsely settled regions. Take consumption, for instance, and diseases of the nervous system. Out,of every 100,000 of ( population in cities, 285 persons die of consumption. Out of every 100,000 of population in 'rural districts, 160' persons die of consumption. In diseases of the nervous system the figures are respectively 255 for the city and 150 for the country. ' These data give a very good general idea, of the increased risk of living in.large cities. In reality, probably very' few people are acquainted with these facts, or if they are very few would be influenced by them in the choice of a home. And yet, when we take up our abode in a great city like New York, how deliberately we increase the number of factors which are constantly conspiring to shorten our lives. We nearly double our chance of dying of consumption, and inorease by 75 per cent, the likelihood of acquiring some fatal nervous disorder. It would prove interesting reading if the intricate web of causes which produce such results could be unravelled — whether of poverty or tenement-crowding, alcoholism, dissipation, the excitement of speculation, or business reverses, its position of relative importance could be assigned. Effect of Tobacco Smoking on the Voice.— Sir Morell Mackenzie has recently written upon this subject, and hia remarks should receive attention by those who practise public speaking or singing. He tells us that most of the leading .actors in London suffer from a relaxed condition of the upper part of the throat, brought on, he believes, entirely by smoking; but actresses are rarely affected in that way. He has noticed the same thing in the case of military officers and clergymen. It is not necessary to be a smoker to encourage these Bymptoms, -for a delicate throat exposed to an atmoj sphere laden with the fumes of tobacco such \ as is often met with in a railway oarriage, is, [ we learn, even worse than the use of the ' cigar or pipe. The oriental hookah is, in Dr Mackenzie's opinion, the least harmful apparatus to use, for the smoke passes through water, and is robbed of its heat before it enters the system ; and the cigarette, so fashionable nowadays, is the most dangerous. — When a man is kind to a woman Bhe forgets that he was ever cross, and when a woman is cross to a man he forgets she was ever kind. Both'as an anodyne and expectorant,' Ayer's Oherry Pectoral is prompt ia its action. It oheoki the advance of dtieua, allayi all tendenoy to Inflammation and|oowumptlon, and ipwdlly roioret health,