| Show I 1 COAL TAB AS A therapeutic AGENT coal tar and its preparations as a therapeutic agent are rapidly coming to the front among the recent kalua i ble additions to the materia medics medica are various preparations derived from gas or coal tar to which a special interest Is attached from the not unreasonable 1 anable expectation that from the same source may be drawn an efficacious remedy for asiatic cholera A prominent american weekly in reference to this matter says in the condensing vc vessels of coal gas works Is a gas from which is obtained the aate of ammonium this has a whole some influence on diseased conditions of the intestinal membranes it might have been inferred from the many useful medical agents extracted from coal tar that the exhalations exha lations from the processes of gas making would be beneficent nefi cent As a matter of fact however it was not until the exceptionally good health of gasworks gas works employed emp loyes was observed that anybody recognized the medical value of the gasworks gas works atmosphere during the last severe epidemic of cholera in paris latwas noted that those workmen who remained for many hours in ot the offensive air of the gas works were positively exempt while those less exposed pc sed to that atmosphere were affected by that disease but to a lower degree than workmen in other occupations this led dr lemaire to make a dyste i matte matic study of the subject of whose deaths he made a matter of record were specially occupied with coal tax tar these not only experienced an absolute freedom from epidemic diseases to which a large percentage of the others fell victims but only three suffered from any sickness in the course of seven years dr bauley a professor tn in the veterinary school at alport was the first to call attention to the exemption of the gas workmen from cholera but nobody undertook to verify his investigations now however we may look for medical men everywhere to study the subject on the first appearance of asiatic cholera in paris whenever there Is j an epidemic of whooping cough or croup hundreds of mothers and nurses crowd the yards yard of the gas works in order to give the afflicted children the benefit of tha offensive atmosphere although no record is made of the results the increasing population to Is an j indication that they are favorable medical record |
