ASIATIC CHOLERA.

Waikato Times, Volume XXI, Issue 1771, 10 November 1883, Page 6

ASIATIC CHOLERA.

Bi DB. MACKENZIE GAMEBON,

'/OBMERLY MEDICALLY -EMPLOYED TJNDER THE aoVEBNMJSNf OF INDIA.) Cholera is a term ,of dread among both the medical the lay publio^ It is a-diseaae-orplagueXwhiohhas, as yet, baffled - all the reflearoheo.'-'of-'i the' fdtmexifi, terribly" pwift;an^B?'^&ati6n ; (^a«in6tqiUttprd^'

nothing about it, and, like everything unknown, it is magnified in regard to its dangers. We have studied cholera in its native home in Bengal, where it is endemic and always present for many a long year. We have followed its course and traok along the sultry plains of North and Woat India. We have treated it in the equatorial swamps of Borneo. We have been day and night exclusively occupied in dealing vrith it. To few have the opportunities been given of seeing it so extensively. Knowing the disease, therefore, as we do, and considering the sad and disastrous oonsequences whioh would ensue were it once to enter Australia, without" any enlightenment being given regarding it, we furnish this paper on it in the hope that it will prove useful, not only to the medical profession in Australia, who are presumedly for the most part entirely unacquainted with it practically, but to the mass of the 'intelligent lay public. We would, if we could, prevent that unseemly panic — which, in the case of cholera would only serve to spread the epidernio — which made both the colonial governments and the members of the medical profession a laughing stock to outsiders during the late outbreak of small-pox. And we would instil some knowledge of rightly dealing with it. As we have long since relinquished practice, it will be seen that we have no oovert motive of increasing our golden medical fees in penning this article. At the outset, too, we must state, that to write a full treatise on Asiatic cholera would fill a volume, and that such is not our purpose here. We must also pass by theories regarding the origin and propagation of the choleraic poison. We must likewise abjure a rigidly scientific style and nomenclature, so as to be popularly understood, else were the object of our writing this almost lost. The telegrams of late from West and East and North have, one on another, brought us i the news of cholera of a virulent type, having broken out iv widely-sundered places, but hemming AusdraZia in as it were in a centre. First came the news of the outbreak in Egyps, which alarmed all Europe, and still alarms. Next came the statement that there had been upwards of twenty cases of cholera in an Indian Coolie ship arriving in Fiji, which at once gave Australia a start. We may here note that we can with dead certainty fix on the causes which produced it on board the ship, independently of everyone of the five hundred souls arriving from a cholera country. That would, however, take us out of our way, and we must proceed. Finally, the news was flashed to us that cholera had broken out at Swatow, a seaport of China. Thus^ at the present time, cholera has appeared' to the west of us, to the east of us, and to the north lof us. Australia, however, lies far enough away from any of these points. Still, having regular and recurring communication with all these places, the necessary quarantine proclamations have not been issued a day two soon in each colony. But yet the disease may make its appearance on board a vessel anchoring in an Australian port ; and if so, we trust that the notes we furnish below will have the tendency of checking panic, alarm, and hasty action, and of moderating the disease should it appear among us. First, then, in our opinion, cholera is not contagious to the otherwise healthy individual. We have been right in the midst of it morning, noon, and night ; have passed through files of sufferers ; had their evacuations oast on us ; have clasped those laid up with the malady ; and have lived among them and with them. The ordinary precautions of cleanliness, a full stomach, some scent or camphor, and faith in God, are all that are requisite. Any unpleasant preliminary feelings, with which the attack almost always commences, may be removed by being, as the Apostle says, " seasoned with salt," literally — that is, eating a little salt. This is the only prophylactic or preventive of the disease yet known, and it is infallible. It is also within the reach of everyone at once. A capital plan, during an epidemic, is to take a teaspoonful of oommon table salt in the morning, washing it down with a little water. The efficacy of this domestic and universally employed condiment was discovered entirely by chance during a cholera epidemic on a sugar plantation in the island of Mauritius. Since then, there is not an eminent medical gentleman in India, but who relies on it for the premonitory symptoms. It has never been found efficacious after the disease has manifested itself. And yet, as the following anecdote will show, there may be many Indian physicians even who may be ignorant of its virtue. In 1863, during a severe cholera epi demio in Agra, in the ■ North- Western provinces of India, we happened to arrive there, and stayed there for a few days. Immediately on our arrival a buggy waited on us, with a note from the superintendent of the Church Mission Orphanage there, asking us to come. We went, and the superintendent told us that cholera had broken out among the orphans, of whom there were some six hundred or eight .hundred, males and females, that forty-four were already down and some had died, and that the two or three surgeons of the station — medical gentlemen of high rank and mark — had been able to do nothing ; not a single case had been cured, and that daily more and more were being taken ill. We at once ordered all the inmates out into tents under the shady trees, and told the superintendent to give each orphan, well or ill, a little salt every morning. He looked rather disappointed at the simpleness of the remedy. However, he said he would carry out all our instructions. We were never again sent for there during our brief stay of some eleven days ; but the day before we left the station to proceed further, we drove in to the Orphanage. The honest superintendent — a most pious and kind-hearted German clergyman — met us wite a beaming smile of evident thankfulness. " Well," said we, "how is the cholera now ? " "Oh ! " said he, grinning affably, "it has quite left us." "How was it? "we asked. "Well," said he, " immediately after you left I thought I should lose no time jn waiting for the morrow, and so at once gave each boy and girl a small lump of rock-salt to lick, seeing carefully that they finished them and not threw them away. To those who were laid up I also gave, at once a dose of salt. I continued this the next day, and the next, and have continued it to this. Not one additional xase of cholera has since occurred, and the number who were laid up when you came and saw us, are now all well and playing about with the rest." On another occasion, far away from Agra, we were woke up from a sound sleep by an indigo planter, whose head native manager had been taken ill with cholera, to prescribe something for him. We replied to " give him some salt." Thinking we were fooling him, he turned away hastily, prescribed himself the usual brandy and chlorodyne remedies, and that evening the man was a corpse. On another occasion, closeted with an eminent doctor in charge of one of the largest hospitals in India, we put the home question to him, "what he would himself take if attacked by cholera." > Without the least hesitation he replied, "salt." During the severe epidemics we always carried in our pocket an ounce phial of common table salt for our own use if necessary ; and on one ocoasion had to use it, and of course successfully. The preliminary symptoms, however, are as full of anxiety and depression, with almost a loss of memory, that we had entirely forgotten the salt we carried about with us, and while unable tb think even of any remedy, the way in which we were reminded of the salt was so remarkable that it will always remain firmly embedded in our being as an indubitable proof of a special providence, and tlie efficacy of the Bible. . The very worst form of Asiatic oholera, in which a person otherwise' in perfeot health is suddenly stricken down, rapidly passes into a state of complete oollapse; and in a'-few hours is a' corpse; is one 1 which is but seldom seen even in the -worst epidemioseason in "Bengal — the original Jand true:;natiye-home of the,, fell disease. there'are the piemoni-, tory^sympt6'mßj4\rKioK"'m|ySb r esat ' on'fte*' attandedgtoiX Andr'gendraUy^totf jthe .'disease;* even* ln^jVery v s&yere

tended to before the vital powers hate been overcome, the generality of cases recover. The treatment here, where salt is of no avail, is a judicious exhibition of pills made up of sugar of lead, camphor, chloroform, cayenne pepper, and a little opium. A young lady, however, was brought round from the stage of fatal collapse by being dosed ad libitum with that pleasanteat of all drinks, champagne. The native Indian and Chinese modes (mechanical) of curing cholera are both very efficaeioui; but too cruel and painful for ordinary feelings, or likely to come into ordinary use. As many people, however, dia after being brought round from an attack of cholera as directly from the disease. Thi« is owing to unskilful handling after the symptoms have subsided, and the patient is utterly weak, though in a fair way to recovery. A relapse from inattention, unsuitable fare (even meat broth is sometimes fatal), and a sudden stoppage of suitable medicines, is almost always fatal. < " During the last epidemic of cholera in Great Britain, it was found that those who were addicted to drink were more liable to get the disease, and also to succumb under it. This was shown remarkably in Glasgow, where the worst public-houses formed the very centres of fatality. Whether, therefore, this dread and fatal disease— dread and fatal only when disregarded or unknown — originates in the liver, as its name and the efficacy of salt would show ; or in the blood, as is also extremely | probable ; or in a specific poison (powerless over the healthy guarded body) as its course over countries and continents bear out ; we trust we have shown that there is no reason to stand in unreasoning dread of it ; that there is no need of the absurdity and wickedness of quarantining separate houses where one may be attacked by it; and that the frr+eatment, if taken in time, is extremely simple, and almost sure to suooeed. With the knowledge of these facts disseminated to the publio, we trust we have robbed the disease of all its imaginary and unreasoning terrors and much of its vitality. But it must always be remembered that disease is disease ; that God holds the balance of life and death ; and that the physician is specially, as put in the Apocrypha, created of God. We conclude with the following prescription for oholera pills :—: — Be Sugar of Lead grs. xx. Camphor gr«. xii. Cayenne grs. vi. Opii grs. yi. 01. pip. meuth. mins. iv. Divide into 24 pills. Two a dose every four hours.