Page 3 Advertisements Column 2

Patea Mail, Volume II, Issue 116, 20 May 1876, Page 3

PRECAUTIONS AGAINST THE SPREAD OF TYPHOID FEY Ah. Drawn uj» by William Oglu. M.A\ M.D., Oxou., F.11.C.P. Load., Modi cal Officer of’ Health for the .''combined districts of East Herts; and circulated by the Sanitary Authorities. riIYPHOID, enteric, or gastric fever J- , are the names given to one and the same infectious disease, this being a fever produced by excremental poisoning and almost invariably accompanied by diarrhoea. Of all excremental matter, the most poisonous is that which comes from persons themselves ill with the fever; and it is principally by means of their stools that the disease spreads from one person to another. The poison may be taken in -by breathing the effluvia from these' dr from the privy, cesspool, or drains into whichthey have been emptied ; or by drinking water from wells into which they have soaked; or by swallowing particles that have adhered, to clothes, bedding or other objects, and thence been accidentally transferred to articles of food or cooking utensils. Destruction of the fever poison in the stools, the moment these leave the body, by means of disinfectants, and (inasmuch ns the action of disinfectants is not thoroughly certain) the safe disposal of the stools themselves, are the, .means by which we should try to prevent the disease from spreading. Let all persons, therefore, who would keep themselves and their -.neighbours free from infection, observe strictly the following rules sbnold the disease occur in their bouses: 1. Remove at once from the sickroom all carpets, curtains, and other objects likely to got fouled. 2. Keep every one whose presence is not absolutely necessary out of the sick room, and by means of open windows and open doors give the patient as much fresh air as possible. > . * 3. Put a piece of waterproof sheeting under the bed clothes,, in the middle of the hod, so as to prevent the bed from getting soiled. 4. Put a teaenpful of the following disinfecting fluid into a bed-pan or other vessel each time before the patient uses it, and add some more immediately after;— Soda water, a gallon ; sulphate of iron (i.e., copperas), a pound; caiv | bblic acid (the common impure kind), half a pint. In preparing this fluid the iron should first be dissolved by stirring in boiling water, .and the carbolic acid added when the iron is dissolved and the fluid cool. Remember that carbolic acid is a poison ; keep the mixture therefore in a safe place. The same fluid may be used with great advantage to disinfect any accumulation of filth, such as a dung-pit or cesspool. As a general rule two quarts will suffice to disinfect one cubic foot of foul matter. I 5. Take care that the discharges arc thoroughly mixed with the disinfecting fluid, and then curry them. immediately into the garden or field, and bury them in a deep trench, previously dug for the purpose, as far as possible from any well or other water supply. On no account let them be thrown on to a refuse heap. If the bouse be in a town, and without a garden, so that the stools must of necessity be thrown down the closet, add a double allowance of the. disinfectant, and take care.that the, emptying be done without splashing the scat, and that the closet be flushed until 1 basin and pan are thoroughly clean. ‘ 6. Let bed and body linen, immediately it is taken off; be put into a tub of water, to which carbolic acid has been added, in the proportion of half a pint of acid to a bucket of water. Have the tub and fluid ready prepared and at band before the linen is taken off. ’ Let the linen soak in this for two hours, and and thou let it be actually boiled in washing, On no account must the linen be sent to a laundress without thorough previous disinfection, nor without informing her of its character, so that she may not wash it with the linen of other persons. 7. Let the nurse observe the most scrupulous care to keep everything clean. Let her wear a dress of washing material, as tills is more easily disinfected than wool. As her bands must almost unavoidably get soiled in helping the patient, let them wash them frequently in water to which some disinfectingfluid has been added, and let her/take care that the water thus used,-as well as all other slops, be emptied carefully into! the garden trench. 8. When the illness is over, the bed if soiled, should be burnt; or the tick or sacking cover may be disinfected by thorough boiling, and the flock or straw stuffing burnt. Should there bo a disinfecting oven available,the stuffing of hair mattrasses may be teased out and then disinfected by baking at. a temperature of 250deg. F. ■ Otherwise' this also should be ‘ ( J t 9. If fever he in your neighbourhood but not as yet in your house, take the following precautions to keep it out: —Drink no water that is open to the least suspicion, of, if you can get no other, boil it before drinking. _ Use no closet or privy that is used 'by houses in which there is already" fever. Give immediate notice to the Sanitary Inspector of any nuisance in your neigh bourhood, such as a stinking drain dr guily, heaps of offensive refuse, and the like. Use all yonr influence influence o insist upon the proceeding precautions teing strictly * earned out by your bcingbbours whose houses are alrady infected.