TYPHOID SCOURGE. FOUR HUNDRED WORKMEN ATTACKED. ONE IN TEN SUCCUMBS.

Te Aroha News, Volume VII, Issue 420, 16 November 1889, Page 4

TYPHOID SCOURGE. FOUR HUNDRED WORKMEN ATTACKED. ONE IN TEN SUCCUMBS.

" Fok the past fouv weeks," says a New York despatch of October 17th, " typhoid fever has been decimating the workshops of the New York Central Raihoad at Albany. Out of 1,200 employees 400 have been stricken with the disease and ton per cent, of these have died. The fever is nowknown as the West Albany or cur-shop fever. It is malarial, developing into typhoid, and caused by dtiiikincr contaminated water and working in the thops, which are on low, unhealthy ground. The theory of the Board of Health is that the epidemic was due to the noxious vapours from the giound around and under the bhops in which they worked. Tno buildings stand upon hlled land. Into this spongy mass imperfect chain* have been belching filth for years, until it has become Suddenly there en mo a feiieb of heavy rains, washing the vile contents of the sewers into the .soil, until the \ery surface reeks with it. A protracted season :>t intense heat followed, and the whole ground was changed into a festering mass of corruption. Such s-eems to be a reasonable explanation of the fever at the West Albany shops To appreciate the figures in this case, it may be well to recall tho fact that the mortality rate fiom typhoid after the Conemaugh Hood was ju«t the tame at> in this case — one in ten. The men say the result ot the epidemic will be to cause gicat privation this winter, as nearly every one who was stricken down was the head o a large family. Probably the wor&t case of want is that of Mrs Bealb. Her two son.^ were both stricken among the first victims of the fever, as was aloo their brother-in-law, named llohn. All three died, one of the sons leaving a young wife and three small cnildren. On the morning after tho last iuneral the neighbours v/ere compelled to furnish the survivors with food, as they had u^ed every cent in buying necessaries for the sick and paying for the funerals. Mrs Beals says her yon told her before his death that he had wanted to quit work two days before he was taken down, but the foreman refused to let him go on account of the quantity of work on hand. There is no hiding the fact that the fever has depopuleatd die shops.