OCR Text |
Show CARING FOR THOSE IN QUARANTINE. The smallpox epidemic in the northern part of this county is a reminder that the problem of quarantining patients afflicted with contagious diseases is a difficult one to successfully solve. There should be better arrangements for caring for those who are not capable of enduring the strain of quarantine, but this defect is not peculiar to this county or city. Here is a letter appearing in a Chicago paper, pointing out the failure of that large and prosperous pros-perous city, where there are hundreds of kindly disposed men of wealth seeking to do good in a philanthropic way, in the caring for suffering men, women and children in times of epidemics: Dear Sir The facilities for handling scarlet fever in Chicago are notoriously and criminally inefficient. It is not generally known what a scourge this disease is and what ultimate expense the state has to bear because of not properly prop-erly providing for these cases among the poor or in those flats or homes in which it is impossible to maintain an effective quarantine. The county hospital has hardly 125 beds for scarlet fever patients. At present thirty families are waiting to get some of their number into tlie county hospital. In the winter 1,000 beds are required to handle all who would gain entrance. One of the most trying things I have to do is to quarantine a poor family for scarlet fever. County care would eliminate most of the trouble and allow the parents to pursue their ordinary labor. Trusting you will take an interest in this matter, I remain, The foregoing was written by a distinguished doctor and proves how far short of meeting the demands of .humanity are the provisions provi-sions for caring for the afflicted, even in a city of the financial strength and means of Chicago. |