"The Lancet" reports of the International Congresses of Hygiene and Demography : held from 1876 to 1889.

  • The Lancet
Date:
1891
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: "The Lancet" reports of the International Congresses of Hygiene and Demography : held from 1876 to 1889. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    PREFACE. THE meeting in England of what is officially the seventh, but practically the eighth, International Congress of Hygiene and Dem- graphy is an event full of promise for the future. England, on- fortunately, has so far taken only a small part in the international movements in favour of sanitary reform. From the very first, we have urged that we ought, on the contrary, to be in the van of this universal crusade against preventable disease. For this reason we have followed with assiduity all the Congresses that have been held on the Continent. With the one exception of the Turin Congress, we have had a special representative at each of these gatherings. Thus it is in the columns of the Zancet that will be found the fullest descriptions of the past Congresses. The per- sistent publicity we have given to this question, our reiterated com- plaints as to the indifference shown by English sanitary reformers towards the earnest endeavours of their continental colleagues, have at last borne fruit; and now the Congress, for the first time, meets in England. But it is essential that Englishmen, especially, should know something of what has been done by other nations in times gone by. We are also anxious that the sanitary reformers of the Continent should realise that, in any case, the Lancet has not ignored their excellent work. For these reasons it has occurred to us that a reprint of what we published at the time concerning each of the different Congresses would be of use. This history of the past Congresses is necessarily incomplete. Our representative could not be present in all the Sections at one and the same time. Also it was only as the Congresses grew in im- portance and gathered in strength that more and more space was devoted to the accounts of what had been done. Nevertheless, the following articles, for the most part written on the spot and while the Congresses were progressing, will give some idea of what these*
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