A treatise on Asiatic cholera / edited and prepared by Edmund Charles Wendt, in association with Drs. John C. Peters, Ely McClellan, John B. Hamilton, and Geo. M. Sternberg.

Edmund Charles Wendt

Date:: 1885

Credit: A treatise on Asiatic cholera / edited and prepared by Edmund Charles Wendt, in association with Drs. John C. Peters, Ely McClellan, John B. Hamilton, and Geo. M. Sternberg. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Gerstein Science Information Centre at the University of Toronto, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Gerstein Science Information Centre, University of Toronto.

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$a 3, I'hat three regiments of C'ossacks may be immediately placed at the disposal of the civil administration for the quarantine service, 4. That all outlays necessary for the execution of the measures above referred to, and to meet the expenses of all measures that may be required b}' the present epidemic, ma}^ be charged to the account of the imperial treasury. It was the unanimous conclusion that the plan of burning the colony of Wetljankaja (the center of the infection) is proposed after a thorough examination of the question, and from a conviction of the indispensable necessity of so radical a measure for the extirpation of the disease in the locality whei'e it first appeared—the committee having subsequently heard the opinion of the physicians present, both with regard to the measure in question, and in general in relation to the means which have been shown by science and experience to be best adapted to put a stop to an epidemic, and to prevent it from spreading. In addition to the irregular troops mentioned above, bodies of infantry were placed at the disposal of the civil establishments, and unlimited credit was opened to meet all expenses from the treasury. His ]\Iajesty the Emperor sent a special commissioner plenipotentiary. A commission was appointed to act in the matter, composed of medical specialists, whose duty it was to study the subject of the progress of the epidemic, and the proper means of stamping it out, and purifying the localities then infected or those likely to become so; and in view of the impression produced in foreign countries by the reports of the plague, they should furnish to this government reliable information concerning the epidemic, and the meas- ures adopted against it; and the instructions were carried out as above outlined, under the direction of Aide-de-Camp General Count Loris-Meli- kolf, Avho was sent to the infected locality with the rights and privileges of a temporary governor-general. On the arrival of Count Loris-Melikolf, in March, 18T9, an international sanitary council was held, composed of the most distinguished sanitarians of Europe, Professors Hirsch, Besia- detsky, Cabiadis, Petrisco and Eichwald. By the advice of the Inter- national Council, a general sanitary cordon was established all round the province of Astrakhan, with the object of protecting Russia and neighbor- ing countries of the empire, and Professor Eichwald advised that the sani- tary cordon should be maintained around the infected region until the :3d of May. These measures were entirely successful, and the plague did not spread to any other place outside of the originally infected district, nor has it reappeared. In the United States a land quarantine was established under my di- rection for the prevention of the spread of yellow fever in Texas in the summer of 1882. A serious epidemic of yellow fever broke out in Bagdad, Tampico, and Matamoros, Mexico, and soon spread to Brownsville, in the State of Texas. There were in a short time, out of a city of some 5,000 inhabitants, between five and six hundred persons sick of yellow fever. A general panic pre- vailed throughout southwestern Texas, and refugees were leaving that part of the State in great numbers, as it was believed the infection would rapidly and certainly extend to the surrounding country. Under these circumstances, an appropriation of §100,000 having been placed at the dis- posal of the Treasury Department to prevent the spread of epidemics, by the President, the Governor of the State of Texas applied to the Secretary of the Treasury for assistance from the general government; and, as the exact$