Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: State control of tuberculosis. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University Libraries/Information Services, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University.
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![If for no other purpose than to give an ()])portnnity for such Htudy, the wtate should recpiire the report of all cases of tuhercnlosis. It is just as important to study other varieties of tuberculosis as it is to study ])hthisis. They should all he reported as is recjuired in a number of existing regulations. There has been considerable opposition to the notification of this disease, but it is believed that this has been due largely to a fear that the health officer would interfere with the family phy- sician by the advice which he miglit give to the patient. If the health officer does not so interfere, but merely co-operates with the physician, it is believed that it will not l)e any more difficult to secure reports of tuber- culosis than it is of scarlet fever. It should be the duty of the health officer to study with the help of the attending physician the causation of every case re- ported. Notification presupposes correct diagnosis, and therefore every state and city should certainly offer facilities for tlie examination of suspected sputum. Education. Every sanitary official should do all that he can in every way to spread abroad a correct knowledge of the causation of this as of all other communicaljle diseases. The daily press usually affords valuable assistance in this. Another and most useful means of educating people is by means of circulars. Every local health officer shoidd provide himself with a circular explaining the means by which tuberculosis is spread, and describ- ing what precautions should be taken to prevent its spread from one person to another. Such a circular should be prepared with very great care. It should be](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b21226209_0054.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
