The cause and prevention of yellow fever at New Orleans and other cities in America / by E.H. Barton.
- Barton, Edward H.
- Date:
- 1857
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: The cause and prevention of yellow fever at New Orleans and other cities in America / by E.H. Barton. Source: Wellcome Collection.
48/440 page 14
![u tion were those made by Dr. W. Stone, of this city, before a learn- ed body of physicians of New York, in which he expressed the opinion that moisture was not essential [for yellow fever], for it raged equally in the high lands and the low—where the dry trade winds blow, or where the air was darap.f h A continued heat in a certain high degree was once supposed es- sential ; but this is now disbeUeved, for in 1847 it commenced early, in '53 earlier—say in latter part of May or June, when there was no steady heat. We had a remarkably cold spring that year. c This year [1855] it was very dry, and the sugar cane died for want of moisture, and all wei'e suffocated by dust when the disease first appeared. d It appeal's in all climates that are almost perfectly healthy, where there are no remittents or intermittents, nothing bnt accidental sickness. e Filth does not appear to give any virulence to the disease. ■ Many who investigate yellow fever form theories and afterwards hunt for facts, and they are apt to get hold of instances which favor their theories. These when arranged in a catalogue appear quite for- midable, but when investigated, quite a different result is obtained. These statements I would not have noticed, had they been derived from an authority less distinguished; but coming from the source, they did, and uttered ex cathedra, before a body of medical savans, in the face of records and experiments, most of which are now before the world, I am in duty bound, not only out of self-respect, but what I owe to my colleagues, to defend the positions I have ushered forth with my name. a. Contains nothing but assertions, and all equally true! whether of the Dry tradewinds which no one ever saw in this hemisphere, or where the air was damp or dry, and is met by the statement I aver to be true, and which I will prove presently, that yellow fever never originated but with a high dew-point. The presence or absence of rain is not sufBcient to indicate moisture or dryness, as I will soon demonstrate. b. A high temperature of many weeks, if not of months duration, t Vide Records of tlie Academy of Jledicine of New York, published in the New York Medical Times for November, 1855, No. 556.](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b20402521_0048.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
