Plague : how to recognise, prevent, and treat plague.

  • James Cantlie
Date:
1900
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Plague : how to recognise, prevent, and treat plague. 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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    person from an uninfected locality develops plague after a single temporary visit to a locality or dwelling where persons are suffering from the disease, it may be safely inferred that the visit and the infection stand to each other in the relation of cause and effect. Such seemingl}^ exact processes of infection as post-mortem wounds followed by an attack of plague are not necessarily the correct interpretation of how the disease was acquired, for persons so wounded may have acquired the disease immediately previous, or subsequent, to their presence at the 'pod-mortem. A doctor dwelling in a plague-stricken locality may develop the disease after a single visit to a plague hospital, yet the visit may not be the cause of the infection. A nurse receiving the sputum of a patient suffering from pneumonic plague on the conjunctiva may not have become infected thereby, although, no doubt, this is possible; the nurse may have become infected before or after the occurrence. Kat-catchers may ascribe infection to handling dead rats, stretcher-bearers to carrying a dead body, sanitar}^ inspectors and workers to cleansing premises; yet each and all, if they reside in a town or locality in which plague is prevalent, may have contracted the disease from other sources. Should a plague-infected ship reach a healthy port, and should amongst the shore hands un- loading the cargo plague develop in a few days, it may be safely assumed that the period of exposure dates from that time. Were the disease not to appear until, say, ten days subsequent to having finished handling the cargo of the plague-infected ship, then the source of the disease, in all probabilit}^ is not due directly to the cargo, but to the rats which have found their way on shore. To prevent falling into error on these points great caution is necessary, and the most careful and patient in- vestigation is requisite. Incubation.—Three to fi^-e days is the usual period which intervenes between the period of exposure to plague and the development of symptoms of illness; as many as ten days, however, have been known to intervene, and this may be taken as the maximum incubative period. It is important to remember that ten days does not mean the tenth day, a mistake Avhich is frequently made in estimating the limits of the incubation for this and other infectious diseases, and frequently with dire results. During the incubation period no definite indications
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