An Insidious Foe.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 6703, 16 November 1889, Page 4

An Insidious Foe.

The recent report of the President of the Central Board of Health on the subject of Typhoid Fever, is a revelation that will startle the most carelesß and thoroughly arouse all who have the public health and well-being at heart. Between the Christmas holidays and the time of the President's report, fifty-two cases of Typhoid Fever were reported, more than 50 per cent or which proved fatal. Dr Rose, is reported by the public press, to have said at the same meeting that if all Typhoid cases were reported, it would be found that the percentage of deaths waa much larger. He believed that at least 76 per cent of the cases ended fatally. Typhoid Fever had many phases which were frequently mistaken for other diseases. In all cases the same poison was at work concentrating itself on the weakest organs of the subject, but that all cases were preventable. The London Lancet says the death rate for Typhoid throughout the Australian Colonies is far higher than in England; in Queensland, of late, being eight times qb fatal. I While there may not, as yet, be any immediate cause for alarm, it is impossible to avoid anxiety on the score of the appearance of typhoid fever in our midst. Typhoid, in a mild form, or induced by exceptional cauee3 in individual instances, iB, of course always with us. But in its aspect aa an epidemic, it becomes a grave and serious matter indeed; and that tiere is danger of its spread in this relatioi, is unhappily apparent. It is the part of wisdom, therefore, that people should be on their guard, and that every care should be taken which sanitary science suggests to fight back the foe. The purity and cleanliness of our habitations, and tieir surroundings are imperative matters. All deposits of offal, dirt, and the like ruuafc be carefully prevented. Disinfectants elould be used freely. Milk should be boiled ere it"iß consumed, and water well filtered, or still better, distilled. But these precautions are not all sufficient. If we would tagion,moveunhatmedinthemidstofaaepidemic, our blood must be pure and healthy. Now, whether from one cause or another, there are very few people whose blood is pure and healthy. The habits of our daily lives ; indulgence in the pleasant vices of eating and drinking ; the inhalation of impure air, not to apeak of the peculiarly debilitating effects upon the human system of the recent changeable and trying weather, all tend to the demoralisation of the circulatory system, and the disintegration of its chemical constituents. The phosphates ate diminished in quantity, and weakened nervous energy in the resnlt. In this condition the Byatem is unable to avoid contagion, or to throw off disease if infected. No perßon is safe whose blood is poor or corrupt, and it behoves everybody who values health and life to remember this. Yet it ie remarkable how few do bo, until stricken down j the more bo, that it is so easy to keap the blood, and the organß upon which it acts, pure and uncontaminated. A regular appeal to Warner's safe cure and safe pills is all that is needed to guard againßt the insidious poiflona which surround ua ; remembering that these agents have been instrumental in saving thousands from infection, and that they have faithfully stood the teßt of experience. Thus fortified, the blood ia invulnerable to the influences of disease germa. The constitution, when restored to its original or natural state, iB impervious to disease, and it would seem that this serious fact is one of those lessons of Providence which have been laid down for our guidance and warning. Health, then, is the eßaential; and health to the blood, and, therefore, to the whole system can be, and is to be aocompliahed, by an application of the faote to wbiohxefeieace-iiaa-beeDumiMle.