Article on Yellow Fever - 1897 Submitted by: Rose Albrizio January 2004 Source: The Daily Picayune (New Orleans) Friday, October 22, 1897 - page 6 ************************************************* Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/la/lafiles.htm ************************************************ DR. WALMSLEY DRAWS HOPE FROM FIGURES. The Course of Yellow Jack Has Been So Uniform That the Present Figures Justify the Inference That the End is in Sight and Within Reach. The System of House Quarantines Has Arrested an Epidemic This Year. MORTALITY TABLE - YELLOW FEVER. Year June July Aug. Sept. Oct. Nov. Dec. 1846 9 168 20 1847 44 965 1,044 158 1853 31 1,521 5,133 982 147 28 4 1854 367 1,160 610 1858 2 132 1,140 2,204 1,137 224 5 1867 3 11 255 1,637 1,072 103 26 1870 3 231 242 106 5 1873 3 19 108 79 17 1878 26 1,025 1,780 1,065 147 3 1897 Sept. 6 first death. Oct. 17, total deaths 93 These figures are taken from the reports compiled by Dr. Joseph Jones. DATA OF THE YELLOW FEVER IN 1897. To End of Sixth Week (Oct. 17). Week Foci Cases Deaths First (Sept. 6 - 12) 6 8 1 Second (Sept. 13-19) 24 32 5 Third (Sept. 20 - 26) 65 98 11 Fourth (Sept.27 - Oct.3) 103 179 19 Fifth (Oct. 4 - 10) 164 260 23 Sixth (Oct. 11 - 17) 146 251 32 Totals 508 828 93 Within five (5) days after quarantine additional cases developed in 46 foci. After lapse of more than five days additional cases developed in 35 foci. No case developed after quarantine in 427 foci. The statistics of the present outbreak of yellow fever disclose many important, interesting and instructive facts that will be shown by reference to the accompanying tabulations, which relate to the past as well as to the present, for the true value of the facts concerning this outbreak can best be appreciated and emphasized by a comparison with the data of previous years for the deductions, seemingly established, are equally tenable, whether we compare the statistics of 1897 with those of other outbreak years or with those of epidemic years. The tabulations show that the course of yellow fever is apparently rapid from the date of its establishment in a community and that it reaches its point of greatest virulency within about 60 days. This rapid progress is irrespective of the month of its incipiency or of coexistent meteorological conditions. This was especially marked in 1847, 1853 and 1854 (see table). From the point of highest activity, the decline is even much more rapid than had been the rate of progress. (This fact is graphically indicated by the above diagram.) For, while the exact month during which this marked diminution occurs is not constant in the several years of prevalence, still, the progress of the disease ceases within a very few days subsequent to the 20th of October, uninfluenced by low temperature, nor necessarily by frost. This is shown particularly in 1847, 1858, 1867 and 1878. Another peculiarity shown by the data of the disease in previous years is a marked increase in the number of its victims immediately preceding the practical extinction of it; a careful inspection of the tabulations according to weeks clearly demonstrates this fact. Consequently, a decided increase in the number of reported cases during this present week does not militate against the early withdrawal of the fever from amongst us at about its usual date of departure. To the contrary, no epidemical disease is quite so regular in its habits as yellow fever; therefore, there is none that so uniformly fulfills intelligent prediction concerning what can be reasonably expected of its course. We are, in view of these facts, justified in believing not only that the end is in sight, but that it is even within reach. The slow progress of the disease during this outbreak is in marked contrast to the rapidity of its spread on former occasions, and in this fact there is another point that should not only attract attention, but should also inspire confidence and give satisfaction. This would certainly seem to indicate the accomplishing of much good by the system of house quarantining, which has been practiced by us. The procedure has never been applied so extensively as now, though the principle is not new by any means. This house quarantine is the only factor present during this outbreak that could possibly have had the least retarding effect upon the spread of the fever. Moreover, it is the only element that was not present at other visitations. We should remember that nineteen years have elapsed since the epidemic of 1878. We, therefore, have a larger number of non-immunes than ever before in the history of our city, thus furnishing a most favorable condition for a phenomenal spread of the disease. In addition, and most unfortunately, the chances for infection were distributed widely at the very incipiency of the outbreak. A comparison between the rate of progress of yellow fever in 1870 to that of the history of it now is perhaps the best deductive argument to establish the retarding effect of house quarantine. For in 1870, only three years had elapsed since the great epidemic of 1867, whilst the population was then only 195,000. the tables show that, although the first deaths from yellow fever occurred only about two weeks before the date of the first death in 1897, it spread very rapidly in 1870, while it spread very slowly in 1897. As a community, we thoroughly believe in quarantine protection against a town or city infected with yellow fever; if, therefore, an individual, even though healthy, can introduce the disease into a place that is free from it by coming from an infected locality, how much more certainly throughout a city if they be permitted to pass freely into an infected house, and then go, without restraint, throughout the whole place? Now, it has been clearly shown by our experience with house quarantining that the liability of non- immunes to contract the disease is not particularly increased by being quarantined in a house where there is a case of yellow fever, for, out of 508 premises which had been quarantined up to the end of the sixth week (17th October), no additional cases of fever developed in 427 of them, after establishing of quarantine. Within five days after quarantining sixty-six cases of fever developed in forty-six foci - in thirty-five other foci sixty cases developed after the expiration of the fifth day. In the first instance all the cases were undoubtedly infected prior to the quarantining; while, on the other hand, the occurrence of the latter cases could not be entirely attributed to the quarantining of healthy people in an infected house. For it is well known and acknowledged that yellow fever frequently does not develop till after a lapse of ten days, or even longer, from the date of exposure to infection. Had these 126 individuals, and also the many more who might probably have gone into the houses, except for the presence of the guard, been allowed to go at will through the length and breadth of our city, can it possibly be denied that each of these walking mediums of infection might have given rise to numberless additional cases? I believe, therefore, that we have good ground for hopefulness; for the restraining effect of the season of the year, combined with the retarding influence of house quarantine - of which the value has been sufficiently established to satisfy any reasonable mind - will surely shortly terminate our present calamitous predicament. R. W. WALMSLEY.