Hints on drains, traps, closets, sewer gas, and sewage disposal / by P. Hinckes Bird.

  • Peter Hinckes Bird
Date:
1877
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Hints on drains, traps, closets, sewer gas, and sewage disposal / by P. Hinckes Bird. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    On referring to the 9tli report of the Medical Officer of the Privy Council will be found an account of 25 towns examined by Dr. Buchanan, under the condition of properly-laid impervious sewers, well ventilated and sufficiently flushed, with a free outfall, and the connection of the houses with these sewers; it was found—1, The general death rate was lowered in almost every instance, in two cases as much as 32 per cent.; 2, the mortality of infants, always a good test of sanitary conditions, had decreased considerably; 3, the mortahty from enteric (typhoid) fever was most remarkably diminished in almost all the cases examined. In ten towns the reduction was between one-third and one-half of the total number of deaths from this disease, in nine others it was over a half, being as much as 75 per cent, in one instance. In the three or four cases in which the reduction was very shght, or where there was an increase, it was found that the outfalls were not free, so that the sewage was backed up in the sewers, causing stagnation, and its results decomposition and sewer gas; 4, the cholera epidemics appear to have been rendered ]3racticaUy harmless in the towns examined. As, on the other hand, in many towns it has been found that the improper construction or ventilation of the sewers has been the probable cause of increasing the death-rate, by exposing people to the direct effects of the deleterious gases, we will briefly advert to the influence of sewer gas on health, and then consider the means for preventing it. EFFECT OF SEWER GAS ON HEALTH. At a late meeting of the Eoyal Society, Professor E. Frank- land communicated a paper On the transport of solid and liquid particles in sewer gases. He first referred to the large amount of suspended matter in the air, which consists of aque- ous and other volatile particles that disappear by a gentle heat. There are other particles that consist partly of organic and partly of mineral matters, and the processes of fermentation, putrefaction, and decay afford abundant evidence that zymotic and other hving germs are present among the organic portion. Of the zymotic matters, those which i)roduce disease in man are obviously of the greatest importance, for there are well authenticated cases on record that disease has been comunicated by the germs being in suspension in air that has escaped from sewers. Professor Frankland has considered it important to investigate the conditions under which the germs pass from sewage into the air. Does the flow of sewage in a properly- constructed sewer produce sufficient agitation to disperse liquid particles through the air-space of the sewer ? In this and in