A Diphtheria Cure.

Te Aroha News, Volume XXVII, Issue 4436, 15 July 1909, Page 3

A Diphtheria Cure.

Of late there has been quit? a number of eases of this deadly disease in and about Whangarei. A “ Visitor ” thus writts to the Northern Advocate : “ Sir, —Someone has contributed an article, or short paragraph, on this dreaded complaint, and the instance which he mentions is evidently not the only one in which the valuable vegetable known by the common name cf “ onion,” has played a very prominent part in having cured the patient. The writer resided down Gisborne way for some time, and the malady was

prevalent there to some considerable extent. A doctor had been attending the patients, as customary. However, some friend recommended the mother of a child to make a poultice of boiled onions, mashed up, and applied to the throat very hot. The child was very bad indeed, and after the poultice had been on for a short time, the change was most marvellous. The child called out for a drink, and began to mend there and then, much ‘to the surprise of the doctor attending. He asked to have the poultice when it was laken off, as he wan tel to try an experiment with it. So he procured a young pig, and had it confined in a pen by itself. He gave it the onion poultice as part of its food, with the result that the poor little, animal was dead within the week, thus showing that the poultice had drawn out and absorbed, as it were, the poison or microbe of the diphtheria. This is no fable, for the gentleman is at present residing in Whangarc-i, and can vouch for the truth of the statements here related. Diphtheria is a dreaded disease, and some persons seem to associate it with dampness, as if it lodged in low-lying places ; hut that is scarcely correct, for we find it on all elevations. Places that are more or less, subject to being flooded with rain or storm water, should be freer of bad smells on or in the soil, than places of higher elevation that have not the benefit of these washouts. Residents on the banks of rivers get the benefit of good drainage, and a river or inlet, or, as you might term it, arm of the sea, has a still greater advantage by the inflow and outflow of the tides. This process goes on continually, without the aid of man, carrying with it any deleterious matter that accumulates out to sea, which is replaced next tide by a fresh volume of pure salt water, the exhalations arising therefrom permeating the atmosphere and charging it with ozone, the essence of pure air. It is for this and other elements that people go to the seaside to get rejuvenated bv drinking, or lather getting, their lungs charged with sea salts, and where constant paddling by the youngsters is considered so. healthy. The sailor on the sea is very frequently living in an atmosphere of dampness, and who are healthier than sailors ? —I am, etc , Visitor.