The principles of physiology applied to the preservation of health, and to the improvement of physical and mental education / [Andrew Combe].

  • Andrew Combe
Date:
1844
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The principles of physiology applied to the preservation of health, and to the improvement of physical and mental education / [Andrew Combe]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    73/126 (page 63)
    — > . a a rag d aw ; than from any other single cause, and to the following example both of the extent to which atmospheric impu- rity operates, and the facility with which its deadly in- fluence may be obviated by due attention to the simplest laws of the animal economy. In the number of Chambers’s Edinburgh Journal for 17th April 1841, in reference to the possibility of re- moving the causes of fever, it is said, ‘‘ The chief causes assigned by medical :inquirers are dense population, bad ventilation, and destitution. We shall here adduce strong reasons, to shew that however destitution or any other cause may operate remotely, the immediate cause is deficient ventilation.. There is, in the suburbs of Anderston, a large house, called, from its mode of construction and the vast crowd of human beings who live in it, the Barrack. It is said that nearly five hun- dred persons, chiefly poor Irish, live in this building, each family having one, or at most two, little rooms. At one time, fever was never absent from the Barrack ; five had been seen ill at once in one room, and in the last two months of 1831, the cases in this single house were fifty-seven. During the five years ending with 1839, there were 55,949 cases of fever in the whole city: consequently, it will be observed, this house with (say) 480 inhabitants, ought to have had, as its fair propor- tion, 112 cases, the population of the city being con- sidered as, at a medium, 240,000. But how does the case really stand? Early in 1832, at the recommenda- tion of an ingenious surgeon of the district (Mr Fle- ming), a simple tin tube, about two inches in diameter, had been led from the ceiling of each room of the Bar- rack into a general tube, the extremity of which was inserted into the chimney of a furnace connected with a neighbouring factory ; by which means a perpetual every room, and its inmates compelled, whether they would or not, to breathe pure air. The consequence— for we cannot but consider it as the consequence—was, that during the ensuing eight years fever was scarcely known in that house. Laying aside one year, during which Mr Fleming had not the charge of the apparatus, there were up to last December only four cases.” This remarkable exemption from fever in a building where it was formerly so prevalent is the more instructive, because the purification of the air is the only change which has been effected; and as fever was very preva- lent in the whole city during the very time of this ex- emption, it is impossible not to ascribe the chief part of the protective power to the purer atmosphere now supplied to the inmates of the Barrack. i The same general results are afforded by the statisti- cal returns of the Registrar-General ; but I can make room for only one “ Table, shewing the mean mortality in three groups of the Metropolitan Districts,” ex- tracted from the valuable appendix by Mr Farr, and designed to shew that, ceteris paribus, the mortality in- creases with the density of the population and the im- purity of the air. —— eine di S 2 ar ey ot w ro |b ltes| | ¢ |} fe} 21 3 pistricts. | *|223) 32) 2 | 22) 2 | 3 #e/26 mats. iS ag a 5 ' =6 & & a ce B on (eel g ZS }<s™| & | B | 6 pees | ne | ee | | I Yee 1 to10:mean)|' 35 | 3.498.994 | 349 | .518 | 496 | 831 fii to 20 | 119 fn 679 | 181 | 440 | 405 | 716 #21 to 80 | 180 | 2.989 | .539 | .131 | 374 | .375 | .584 From this table, it appears that .349 deaths from ty- phus occur in the most crowded districts of the metro- polis, and only .131 in the more favourably situate ; the proportions being nearly as five to two. The influence of vitiated air in the production of con- sumption has been noticed and commented upon by many observers, but the evidence of Dr Lombard of Geneva 63 inquiry into individual cases, in the course of which he extended his researches into ‘a total of 4800 deaths from phthisis, and 54,572 individuals exercising 220 different occupations, and found, by a comparison of all the professions carried on in the open air and in work- shops, that the proportion of deaths from phthisis was double among the latter, and this proportion increased as the apartments were close, narrow, and imperfectly ventilated.”’** I need not add one word in support of this most convincing testimony, but only refer to an- other form of disease closely allied to consumption, and itself the cause of an immense mortality, viz. scrofula. The three grand sources of scrofulous disease in those not strongly predisposed to it, are now universally ad- mitted to be the habitual breathing of a vitiated atmo». sphere, an impoverished diet, and impaired nutrition. Of the active influence of the first, the rapid production of scrofula in animals previously healthy, by confining them for a time to the inspiration of an impure air, affords demonstrative proof. But, unfortunately, the fact may be witnessed at any time in the more confined dwellings of the poor in most of our large towns, and also in ill-situate and ill-ventilated workhouses or asy- lums for the young. Among the children in the Dublin House of Industry, for instance, scrofula prevailed very extensively about thirty years ago, and its ravages were not arrested till Mr Carmichael, the distinguished sur- geon of that city, called attention to its chief cause in the extreme impurity of the air in the wards. In one ward of moderate height, 60 feet by 18, Mr Carmichael found thirty-eight beds, each containing three children, or more than one hundred in all! The matron told him, that ‘‘ there is no enduring the air of this apart- ment when the doors are first thrown open in the morn- ing; and that it is in vain to raise any of the windows, as those children who happen to be inconvenienced by the cold, close them as soon as they have an opportunity. The air they breathe in the day is little better: many are confined to the apartments they sleep in, or crowded to the number of several hundreds in the school-room.’’t Can any one read this account, and wonder at the pre- valence of scrofula under such circumstances ! The fourth cause by which the necessary supply of oxygen to the lungs is frequently impeded and disease consequently produced, arises out of the sedentary habits of modern society, and the depression or monotony of mental condition which is apt to result from them. If ever a Divine law was legibly imprinted on any part of animated nature, it is that which declares activity to be the indispensable condition of human health and hap- piness. Every organ, from the highest to the lowest, in the structure of man is framed with a view to daily and habitual exercise, and this law holds equally with the lungs as with the muscles or brain. When we obey this condition of existence, and actively employ the body for some hours every day in the open air, the cir- culation is invigorated and equalized, the respiration is rendered free and deep, and a feeling of vivacity and enjoyment arises, which is the sure accompaniment of health and energy. These results are rendered very obvious in the process of training, during which the wind, as it is called, is known to become remarkably improved. Of this, I witnessed some years ago a very curious in- stance in a strong-built little Irishman, who, for a mere trifle, ran alongside of one of the Glasgow coaches for 32 miles in a very wet day and on a muddy road. The average speed was nine miles an hour, and yet the poor fellow did not seem at all distressed, and stopped only because he had arrived at his destination. In him this amazing strength and activity were obviously connected with the very complete oxygenation of the blood ina pair of capacious and well-exercised lungs. The well-known salubrious influence of a gay and * Penny Cyclop. Phthisis, t Carmichael’s Essay on the Nature of Scrofula. Dublin,