Royal Society of New South Wales, Sydney : anniversary address / by T.P. Anderson Stuart.

  • Thomas Peter Anderson Stuart
Date:
1894
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Royal Society of New South Wales, Sydney : anniversary address / by T.P. Anderson Stuart. 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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    We have yet the important question to consider—What likeli- hood is there of there being disease-producing organisms in the sewers 1 There can be no doubt that such organisms do reach the sewers by the dejecta, etc., of persons and animals, especially during epidemics. But, ev(/n then, the numbers of the harmless microbes are immensely greater than the numbers of the harmful; and we have no reason to suppose that the harmful organisms rise into the sewer air more easily than the harmless. Thus even in epidemics, the proportion of harmful microbes in the sewer air would be small. But all who have tried to make pure cultures of pathogenic organisms, have found how difficult it is to satisfy all the necessary conditions as to temperature and medium, and can understand how unlikely it is that the sewage will offer favourable conditions for their growth and multiplication. Lastly, they will have to compete in the struggle for existence, for food, with the vast numbers of the harmless sorts. Altogether it does not seem likely that the pathogenic organisms will readily thrive, or even survive, in their new surroundings in the sewage. Finally, let us assume that the sewer air really does contain disease-producing organisms, and actually reaches the outer air. They are here in a usually much drier medium than while still in the sewer, and many are killed by the mere drying. They are also exposed to sunlight, and this alone kills many more. Lastly, the survivors are distributed through so large a quantity of air that the chances are more and more against any one ingesting them in such numbers that they overcome the body's protectors, as already described, and really produce their specitic disease. SANITARY LEGISLATION IN NEW SOUTH WALES. A review of the Acts in force in New South Wales relating to the public health unfortunately does not take long. They are as follows, viz. :— The Quarantine Act and its Amendments, 1832 - 53. These Acts deal only with maritime quarantine and the segregation of introduced disease. They do not even apply equally fully to all the ports of the Colony.
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