Plague : papers relating to the modern history and recent progress of Levantine plague / prepared from the time to time by direction of the president of the Local Government Board, with other papers ; sented to both House of Parliament by Command of Her Majesty.

Radcliffe, Netten.

Date:: 1879

Credit: Plague : papers relating to the modern history and recent progress of Levantine plague / prepared from the time to time by direction of the president of the Local Government Board, with other papers ; sented to both House of Parliament by Command of Her Majesty. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by Royal College of Physicians, London. The original may be consulted at Royal College of Physicians, London.

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$III. PAPERS ON THE MEDICAL ASPECTS OF QUARANTINE. Paper I. Extract from the MgMh Annual Beport of the Medical Officer of the Privy Council. {Mr. Simon.) Foreign Epidemics of the Year [1865], and the General Question op Con- tagion IN ITS BEARINGS ON THE PUBLC HEALTH. In relation to the spread of pestilential orders, the year 1865 was of extraordinary and most painful interest. That in this year, after more than a century's interval, the herds of England were revisited by the most malignant of hovine plagues the, to them, unfamiliar murrain of the Russian Steppes, would in itself be a sad distinction of the year. But the eventfulness of 1865 was even less in that field of suffering than in relation to human epidemics; and, in the latter respect, to persons who had to care for the public health, the last nine months of the year were a time of continuous anxiety. Eirst, early in April, it was rumoured that a disease of the nature of Plague coming from beyond the Ural Mountains, and causing depopulation in its coui-se, had not only reached St. Petersburg, where it was said to be causing fearful ravages, but had spread beyond the Prussian frontier, and was prevailing, though in a less destructive form, at Dantzig and various other places in North Germany. Next, in June, came the importation of Asiatic Cholera into Egypt, and thereupon, radiating' from Alexandria, for results which as yet have but begun, the renewed influence ^of this terrible infection in Europe. Thirdly, in September, there was the fact (hitherto, I believe, unparalleled in the epidemiological experience of this country) that an outbreak of Yelloio Fever, fortunately not on a large scale, was occasioned to the population of Swansea by the arrival of an infected ship from Cuba. It was but to a very limited extent that these important occurrences involved pro- ceedmgs which technically were under the Public Health Act, 1858; and strictly speaking, proceedings under that Act are all that I am called upon to' mention here I may, however, so far exceed that limit as to include certain other proceedings which the same occurrences involved, and which were of general sanitary interest • pro ceedmgs of the Lords of the Council, which were either taken under the Quarantine Act, or at least had regard to its administration. ^l!l^rf'*-''^ occurrences to which I have adverted, the rumour in April last i. - Siberian that a Siberian Plague was advancing towards this country, was one which, except Plagne. for the proverbial faculty of rumour to distort as well as magnify what it represents might have justified the greatest alarm.* And it was of course one which tended to raise a question of Quarantine. Under the circumstances, my Lords thought it expe- dient that the facts should be investigated from this Department, and, at their desire I took the reqmsite steps for that purpose. Dr. Whitley was sent to St. Petersburg and Dr. Sanderson to the country of the lower Vistula. The results of these investio-atious are contained m papers which I subjoin-App. Nos. 9, 10, llf; viz., a report which I addressed to the Lord President on the 19th April, and reports subsequently made l)v the two inspectors. Briefly, I may here state that the rumoui- which gave rise to the mquiry had joined together and disfigured two mutually independent truths; one, t..'''^'*'*'''' ^'^'''^ ^^ '''''^^ «f ^'■''^^it' ^-^^ cholera is not the only pestilence which has thus come. Apparently it was through Russia, and perhaps as a Siberian Plai^ne » tW T centuries ago, the Black Death came to England. That, according to ^he best author tls the BJacl Do^^f under the name o Pali Plague, still lives, and from time'to time spreads, in the U e a^^d 'noith^^^^^^ India and, when last told of was even high in the Himalaya,-thit if its infection passed the hills Tittle stoi^ would come to us of how It filtered through the sands of nomad and other savage hfe, but tha pre ent v^^^ mightbe onthe confines of Russia, and then again suddenly of the gravest Em-opcan interest-i^these are considerations which in the minds of persons who know the facts of The case, would check al disposTtion [o treat rumours of Siberian Plague with indifference. aisposition to t [Not reproduced, in these papers, from the original Report.]$