THE CANCER MORTALITY OF BALTIMORE. DR. JONES' interesting tables of cancer mortality (p. 337), like most American mortality tables, illustrate the common weakness of American vital statistics better than the history of cancer during the 14 years covered by the study. As Dr. Jones remarks, a satisfactory study of the cancer question is possible only when detailed information is available concerning the population, and he says that a census of Baltimore is to be made in January and February, 1906. THE PROBABLE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE TABLES. LIKE most hygienists, Dr. Jones is wary of the apparent increase which the figures indicate, and he proceeds to show that the increase, if any, is found in cancer of the liver and stomach. He evidently inclines to the view that improving diagnosis explains the rising figures. Assuming the population figures to be approximately true, it is possible to bring the general increase into comparison with the increase of cancer in more recondite situations by the following somewhat laborious process: Taking the first five years (1891-95) as a norm, one calculates the cancer mortality for each succeeding year by applying the population factor for each year to the average cancer mortality for the five-year period assumed as a norm, and comparing the calculated mortality for each year with the mortality actually recorded. Average population, 1891 to 1895. 456,793 211.2 103.2 From these figures it appears that the total cancer mortality for the nine years, 1896 to 1904, exceeds that which the experience of the five years, 1891 to 1895, should have given by 514 deaths, or an apparent increase of 24.4 per cent. for the last nine years. Applying to the average mortality of the first five years from cancer of the stomach, liver, uterus, and rectum, the population factor for each year from 1896 to 1904, we get the following table: These figures indicate that the mortality actually recorded under the head of cancer of the stomach, liver, uterus, and rectum during the past nine years exceeds that which the experience of the five years, 1891 to 1895, promised for cancer in these anatomic sites by 524 deaths, an apparent increase of 50.6 per cent. A SOUTHERN MAN'S VIEW OF THE MOSQUITO THEORY OF YELLOW FEVER. A PROMINENT citizen of New Orleans who has exceptional opportunities to know the trend of professional opinion, in discussing the yellow-fever situation with a Baltimore physician, said: "I do not believe that the mosquito theory has been clearly stated by the medical profession to the people of the South. When the yellow fever came upon us we had not been told about the work done in Havana; at least we were not impressed as we should have been with the view that the same methods would give the same results in New Orleans. We believe in our medical men and are guided by their advice, even though we have seen their yellow-fever theories come and go. In 1899 we were told that domestic pets, cats and dogs, were the chief agents in the spread of yellow fever, and we submitted to stringent regulations based on this theory. We had always been told that yellow fever spared children, attacking only adults, but in the 1878 epidemic children died in large numbers, and this circumstance caused us to doubt that the epidemic of 1878 was one of yellow fever. On account of the large mortality among children many New Orleans people, some of them physicians, still believe that a strange disease, not yellow fever, attacked New Orleans in 1878. I believe, of course, that it was yellow fever, but the epidemic upset our traditional views about the immunity of infants and young children. We have accepted the mosquito theory in New Orleans, but we did so after the yellow fever arrived. I can't help thinking that if the physicians had pressed the matter on our attention much earlier we would have prepared ourselves against an invasion of yellow fever. It is a business proposition to us. The natives of New Orleans are not afraid of yellow fever. Its ravages do not fall on us, but on the unacclimated. What we fear is the quarantine, which involves discomforts of which you Northern people know nothing. We run away, if we can, but it is the quarantine, and not the yellow fever, that makes us run.” If the views of this gentleman are shared by a considerable body of thoughtful citizens of New Orleans, considerable mental discomfort has been fairly earned by the Southern sanitarians who have hitherto avoided open and complete acceptance of the mosquito theory lest they should stir up strife among the Southern people. The remarks which we have quoted ought to land heavily on the professional conscience. If popular opinion in the South had, in fact, been as refractory to this question as its medical men declared, the people of New Orleans would not have capitulated as promptly as they did in the presence of yellow fever. Their acceptance of the mosquito theory under such circumstances probably does not signify a very intelligent belief, but it clearly indicates very shallow doubt. It is incredible that the people would have abandoned rooted error just for expediency's sake, and it seems likely that the Southern people will follow medical advice in medical matters, at least as faithfully as their compatriots generally do, and that notwithstanding the instability of medical opinion on many subjects. MRS. ABELL'S ARTICLES ON SAFE FOODS AND HOW TO GET THEM. It is of hopeful significance that so many of the popular magazines have recently published articles on the question of pure food. Most of the papers on this subject have been of very little practical value. Some of them have been highly sensational and misleading, but they no doubt signify a popular awakening to the importance of good food, and they have helped to increase the demand for reliable information. The Delineator has undertaken to supply such information in a series of articles by Mrs. Mary Hinman Abell. It is an appropriate task for the Delineator, and that periodical has been fortunate in the choice of an author. There are to be 12 articles in the series, and the first one appears in the September issue. Mrs. Abell commences her task in a very hopeful spirit. The truth that lies between the cry of fraud and poison, on one hand, and the extravagant claims of food vendors, on the other, she thinks may easily be found out by any sensible woman whose domestic instincts are in good working order. She insists that this is a woman's problem, and that the complex machinery which has apparently reduced her to a mere receiver of food materials can be made as sensitive to her wishes as the looms which weave her raiment. Responsiveness more perfect than this none need desire. It is no more difficult, she says, to be informed about the qualities of foodstuffs than to be a discriminating buyer of textile fabrics, and the range within which a woman may easily be an expert buyer of food is no more extended than the same woman's field of expertness in the purchase of clothing. Food vendors are no more prone than other commercial people to defraud their customers. Many of them are themselves well informed about the materials which they distribute and more than willing to meet the demands of intelligent buyers. But so long as family orders are sent by telephone and deliveries are accepted without examination, and so long as food laws do not, in fact, prevent the abuses which are supposed to disappear under their provisions, the standards of the market must obey the practice not of the best, but of the worst vendors. Reform is waiting, not upon the commercial conscience or on the operation of law, but upon the appearance of a large class of intelligent buyers, and these must be women. Summary of Results of Examination Held by the Board of Medical Examiners of Maryland, June 21, 22, 23 and 24, 1905. 5 University of Maryland, '05.. 6 University of Pennsylvania, '02.. 7 University of Maryland, '05.. 8 College of Physicians and Surgeons, '01.. 9 College of Physicians and Surgeons, '05. *10 Baltimore Medical College, '04.. 11 College of Physicians and Surgeons, '05.. *12 Maryland Medical College, '01. 13 College of Physicians and Surgeons, '05. *14 University of Maryland, '04.. 15 University of Maryland, '05. 16 Johns Hopkins, '05.. 17 Woman's Medical College of N. Y., '90. 18 University of Maryland, '05.. 19 Maryland Medical College, '05. $20 21 University of Maryland, '05. 22 Maryland Medical College, '03. +23 24 University of Maryland, '05. 25 Maryland Medical College, '05. 26 Baltimore Medical College, '05. 27 Johns Hopkins, '05.... 28 University of Maryland.. 29 Baltimore Medical College, '05. 30 University of Maryland, '05.. 31 University of Maryland, '04.. 32 University of Maryland, '05. 33 University of Maryland, '05.. *34 University of Maryland, '05. 35 Maryland Medical College, '05. 36 Maryland Medical College, '05. 37 University of Maryland, '05.. 38 Johns Hopkins, '05.. 139 Johns Hopkins... 40 University of Maryland, '05. 41 Maryland Medical College, '05. 42 College of Physicians and Surgeons, '05. 143 Johns Hopkins..... 144 Woman's Medical College. 45 Christ's Institute, '04.. 46 Johns Hopkins, '05.. 47 Maryland Medical College, '05. 48 University of Maryland, '05.. 54 College of Physicians and Surgeons, '05. 55 Baltimore Medical College, '05. 56 University of Maryland, '05.. 57 University of Maryland, '05.. 158 Woman's Medical College, Baltimore.. 59 University of Maryland, '05.. 60 University of Maryland, '04.. 161 University of Maryland.. 62 University of Maryland, '05. 63 Woman's Medical College, '05.. 64 College of Physicians and Surgeons, '05. 168 University of Maryland... 70 Johns Hopkins, '04.. 71 Baltimore Medical College, '05. *72 College of Physicians and Surgeons, '02. 73 Johns Hopkins, '05... 74 Maryland Medical College, '05. 75 Maryland Medical College, '05. 76 Johns Hopkins, '05... 77 Maryland Medical College, '04. 178 College of Physicians and Surgeons. Summary of Results of Examination Held by the Board of Medical Examiners of Maryland, June 21, 22, 23 and 24, 1905–(Continued.) No. COLLEGE OF GRADUATION. Average......... :20:22:48127880 :8:: :3 :228 : :2: :2:2:880IVES :::: Total... 86 90 92 94 86 Practice... 82 48 91 100 50 67 75 42 64 70 +82 83 College of Physicians and Surgeons, '05. 84 College of Physicians and Surgeons, '05. *85 Baltimore Medical College, '03.. 86 Maryland Medical College, '05. 87 University of Maryland, '05.. *88 University of Maryland, '04.. 89 Baltimore Univ. of Med., '99. 90 Johns Hopkins, '99... 91 College of Physicians and Surgeons, '04. 92 University of Maryland, '05.. 93 Christ's Institute, '05.. 94 Baltimore Medical College, '05.. 95 College of Physicians and Surgeons, '05. 96 University of Maryland, '05.. +97 98 Maryland Medical College, '04. *103 Baltimore Medical College, '05. 109 University of Maryland, '05. #111 College of Physicians and Surgeons.. $113 University of Maryland... 116 Baltimore Medical College, '05. 121 Maryland Medical College, '05. 122 Georgetown Medical College, '03. 123 Baltimore Medical College... $124 College of Physicians and Surgeons.. *125 Maryland Medical College, '04. $126 University of Maryland. #127 University of Maryland. 94 128 Baltimore University, '03. $129 Johns Hopkins.. $130 Johns Hopkins.. *131 Baltimore University, '03. 132 Maryland Medical College, '05. 133 Johns Hopkins, '05... 134 Maryland Medical College, '05. 135 Maryland Medical College.. 136 Baltimore Medical College, '05. 137 Woman's Medical College, '05. 138 George Washington University, '05. *139 George Washington University, '04. 140 University of Maryland. '05.. 141 University of the South, '04.. 142 University of Maryland, '04.. *143 Baltimore University, '03. 144 Baltimore Medical College, '01. *145 College of Physicians and Surgeons, '04. 146 Baltimore Medical College, '05.. 147 Baltimore Medical College, '05. *148 University of Maryland, '02.. $149 University of Maryland.. *151 College of Physicians and Surgeons, '04.. 152 Maryland Medical College, '05. 153 Baltimore Medical College... In the above summary those receiving an average of 75 were issued a license to register. Those marked with an asterisk (*)-re examination-had previously failed and were eligible to re-examination in the branches in which they had failed. If they received 75 in every branch in which re-examined, they were issued a license to register; otherwise they are again eligible to re-examination. Those marked with a double dagger (‡)-second-year student-are granted examination in anatomy, chemistry, materia medica and physiology upon completion of their second year of study. Their ratings are carried forward and made a part of the final examination. |