OCR Text |
Show 10 ASK BEfiUUTl OF PiCTURE HOUSES Secretary of State Board of Health Will Recommend Passage of Law, "From a standpoint of health and ! sanitary conditions, every moving pic- tare theater in the state of Utah is a veritable death-trap, and houses outside out-side of the larger cities, where fire ordinances or-dinances are in effect, are just as dangerous dan-gerous from a standpoint of architectural architec-tural construction. ' ' Such is the declaration of Dr. T. B. Beatty, secretary of the state board of health, who is preparing a communication communica-tion for the next legislature on the subject, sub-ject, asking that the legislature provide regulation of moving picture houses on these two important points. From a standpoint or danger to public health, there is not a picture house in the state that is not urgently in ned of regulation, declares the doctor. "The ; importance of this matter cannot be j overestimated," said Dr. Beatty, "for ; nowhere perhaps are conditions so dangerous dan-gerous to the health ot bo many people. , In the first place, every moving picture house is but a darkened dungeon into ! which the light of the sun never reaches, j Jt is in just such darkness that the 1 germs of all sorts of diseases abound j and thrive. I "Sunshine is the best germicide with which nature has provided humanity. It is free to all and does its own work perfectly if but given the opportunity. But in the moving picture house the opportunity op-portunity is denied it. A ray or sunshine sun-shine never penetrates the, gcrm-ladened gloom of a moving picture' house. The result is that the life of these germs is indefinitely prolonged, and they are harbored in the darkness in countless numbers, an ever -present and constant menace' to the patrons of such a place. "It is a well-known fact that in no other public place, perhaps, do so many people from every stage and walk in life come together in such close contact con-tact as in these theaters which are daily patronized by thousands of men, women and children, countless numbers of whom are infected with contagious and infectious diseases of every sort, and who, in the theater, come "into direct contact with uninfected people and spread the disease along. ' ' Germs of infectious diseases are shed from the bodies of the infected ones and left hibernating in the darkness dark-ness of the theater until picked up by some unsuspecting, unprotected and unfortunate un-fortunate individual. "The danger from fires in many houses throughout the state is equally great. Of course, in some of the cities there are building and fire ordinances which require provision to be made for protection of patrons in such emergency, but in many of the houses in the out-, side towns and districts there are absolutely ab-solutely no regulations and no provisions are made to protect the people irom being be-ing burned to death like rats in n trap if fire should develop. In most of these places in fact, all the point where the fire is most apt to develop is the projecting room, which is invariably located at or near the entrance to the theater. And, in most cases, this entrance en-trance is both entrance and exit and the onlv door to the place. "Such conditions as these demand immediate im-mediate attention and proper regulation regula-tion at the hands of the legislature of the state of Utah." |