Boletin De Research Articles

Public Health in Costa Rica

THE March issue of the Boletin de la Oficina Sanitaria Panamericana contains an article on this subject by the President, Dr. Rafael A. Calderón Guardia. The following details are of interest. The birth-rate for 1941 was 42·9 (slight increase) and the death-rate 17 per 1,000. The death-rate for children under one year fell from 132·4 per 1,000 in 1940 to 123·5 in 1941. The services for pre-school and school children have been extended, 11,074 children having been attended by medical men and 18,130 by dentists. During 1941 a section was formed to provide shoes for school children, one of the most important measures for protection of their health. For the first time a travelling exhibition for health education was started and circulated throughout the country. The Tuberculosis Division continued its work of systematic examination of the employees of the various divisions of the department of public health. Of 24,322 persons examined for venereal diseases, 4,242 were found to be infected and 1,305 were classified as doubtful. Soil sanitation was carried out intensively. The anti-malarial campaign was carried on according to the plans of the Rockefeller Foundation. New buildings have been constructed for health units in different parts of the country.

Public Health in Colombia

THE April issue of the Boletin de la Oficina Sanitaria Panamericana contains an interesting paper on this subject by Dr. Eduardo Santos, a former president of the Republic of Colombia. He states that in spite of adverse conditions 140 aqueducts, thirty sewers and twenty new hospitals have been constructed in the Republic in the past fifteen or twenty years. More than eight hundred institutions are now devoted to maternity and child welfare, and the prenatal services number at present 126 as compared with 62 in 1937. During this period hospital beds have been increased from 11,422 to 16,322, and forty-five hospitals with a total of 1,500 beds are now under construction. There are at present twenty-five tuberculosis dispensaries as compared with only four in 1937. The yellow-fever campaign,is being carried on by the Government in collaboration with the Rockefeller Institute, which has an excellent laboratory at Bogotá devoted to the production of yellow fever vaccine. The campaign against typhus and bartonellosis is continuing. There is practical cooperation between the State and private agencies, such as the Red Cross, the Colombia Anti-Tuberculosis League, the Association for the Care of Lepers and other groups.

Distribution of Typhus

ACCORDING to an editorial in the March issue of the Boletin de la Oflcina Sanitaria Panamericana the Panamerican Committee on Typhus and other Rickettsial Diseases set up by the eleventh Panamerican Congress held in Bio de Janeiro in September 1942 has come to the following conclusions. With improvement in the methods of investigation the number of cases and the extent of the geographical areas are becoming more apparent. In Chile and more recently in Bolivia and Columbia there have been several epidemics of typhus. Sporadic cases or small epidemics have been repeatedly notified in the Argentine, Brazil, Peru, Ecuador and Venezuela, while in Central America serious outbreaks have been reported in Guatemala as well as cases in El Salvador, Honduras and most of the Caribbean Islands such as Cuba, Puerto Rico and Jamaica. These diseases form one of the major health problems in some parts of Mexico and the United States, and cases have also been seen in Canada. The rickettsiases found in America may be classified into the following four groups: (1) epidemic, classic, European or louse-borne ; (2) endemic, murine or flea-borne ; (3) Rocky Mountain spotted fever ; and (4) Q fever or nine mile fever, Japanese river fever or tsutsugamushi apparently not found hitherto on the American continent. The problem is particularly serious at the present time owing to the War, the rapid transportation of large numbers of persons to and from infected zones and the difficulty of enforcing maritime and aerial quarantine.

Public Health in Chile

THE January issue of the Boletin de la Oficina Sanitaria Panamericana contains an account of the state of public health in Chile by Dr. Juan Antonio Rlos, president of the Republic.With the exception of an outbreak of cerebro-spinal fever in Santiago and Valparaiso which has been successfully combated, there has been no recent epidemic. Typhus is no longer a menace, and cases of typhoid fever have been decreased by mass inoculation and other measures. An efficient control of drinking water is being carried out. The various mother and child welfare services have been grouped under a Technical Advisory Division, the functions of which have been co-ordinated with those of social security and private institutions. An eye clinic and one for skin and venereal diseases have been completed. Five institutions deal with industrial accidents.

Panamerican Sanitary Congress

AN article in the November issue of the Boletin de la Oflcina Sanitaria Panamericana states that a very high place must be given to the Panamerican Sanitary Congress, which was held in Rio de Janeiro during September 7-18, 1942. Every Republic of South America was represented, and all, with one exception, by specialists including directors and professors of hygiene and authorities on tropical medicine, venereal disease, malaria, tuberculosis, bacteriology, radiology, forensic medicine, dietetics, aerial quarantine, dermatology and public health administration in general. The United States delegation consisted of six members, that of Paraguay eight and that of Chile ten, while that of Brazil was naturally larger. The Dominion of Canada was represented for the first time. The problems discussed consisted of the role of public health in the defence of the hemispheres, followed by more or less closely connected subjects such as malaria, typhus, nutrition, plague, influenza, tuberculosis, quarantine, yellow fever, trypanosomiasis, dysentery, cancer, heart disease and sanitary engineering. Caracas, Venezuela, was selected as the site for the next Congress, which is to be held in 1946.

Classification and Nomenclature of Cancer

THE September issue of the Boletin de la Oficina Sanitaria Panamericana contains an article by Dr. Conrado Zuckerniann, director of the anti-cancer campaign of the Department of Public Health in Mexico, who states that this department seeks the co-operation of the medical profession and the public. Literature on cancer has been prepared for both these groups ; a cancer dispensary is being organized, and a histological service is already open to medical men, to which they may send specimens for examination together with the clinical history. For the sake of standardization of terminology, Dr. Zuckermann has drawn up a classification of new growths according as they are epithelial, mesenchymato-connective, muscular, nervous and gonocytic. As regards nomenclature, the suffix -oma is applied toning growths and -blastema to malignant tumours.

Public Health in Brazil

THE September issue of the Boletin de la Oflcina Sanitaria Panamericana contains an article by Dr. Joao de Barros Barreto, director-general of the National Department of Health, Bio de Janeiro, who states that this department has the following sections: administrative service ; divisions of public health and hospital organization ; Oswaldo Cruz institute for the study of prevalent diseases and the manufacture of sera, vaccines and chaulmoogra esters ; national services for leprosy, tuberculosis, yellow fever, malaria, plague, mental diseases, control of medicine, port sanitation, water and sewerage, and vital statistics, and since September 23, 1942, the national service for cancer. Courses in public health are given by the National Health Department and include microbiology, immunology and parasitology, vital statistics, physiology, urban and rural sanitation, epidemiology and prophylaxis, industrial, child and mental hygiene, nutrition and public health organization and administration. A number of scholarships are granted to medical men through the Panamerican Sanitary Office.

Institute of Tropical Medicine at Havana

THE August issue of the Boletin de la Medicina Sanitaria Panamericana contains an account of the Institute of Tropical Medicine of the University of Havana. It was created on December 8, 1937, under the direction of Dr. Pedro Kouri, who is professor of parasitology and tropical diseases at the University. Its function is threefold: teaching, research and treatment. The courses of instruction are attended by students and post-graduates, many of whom are foreigners. Most of the research is devoted to studies of hookworm, echinococcus, bothriocephalus, ascaris, strongyloides, fasciola, amoeba and a new intestinal parasite first described in 1935, Inermucapsifer cubensis Kouri. The institute contains a Finlay Museum, which has a collection of anatomical specimens, parasites and other teaching material on permanent exhibition, laboratories, a department for drawing, photography, microphotography and microcinematography, and a free dispensary. In co-operation with other agencies, the institute carries on a campaign of popular education and prophylaxis against intestinal parasites. The official organ of the Institute is the Revista de Medicina Tropical.

Trachoma in the Argentine

ACCORDING to the April issue of the Boletin de la Medicina Sanitaria Panamericana, the provinces of Tucumán, Santiago del Estero, Santa Fé, Entre Rios, Corrientes, Salta, Jujuy and Misiones form the area most seriously affected by trachoma in the Argentine. The school is the centre for the control of the disease in children ; specially trained doctors examine the children before school begins, and those found infective are given treatment in dispensaries and are not admitted to school until their eyes are normal. Meanwhile, the patients are visited by public health nurses, who instruct the family in treatment and prevention. Periodic visits to schools and dispensaries are made by medical inspectors of the National Department of Health, and teachers serve as intermediaries between the medical practitioner and the children. Intensive educational work is carried out by posters, leaflets and lectures, and preventive medicines are distributed. The result of this campaign during the last few years has been a reduction of the percentage of children infected with trachoma.

Infant Protection in Mexico

IN an article on this subject in the May issue of the Boletin de la Oficina Sanitaria Panamericana, Dr. Salvador Zubirán, Under-Secretary of Public Assistance, states that Mexico is trying to reduce its high infant mortality, which was 30.5 per 1,000 births in 1905 and 122.7 in 1939, by the establishment of child welfare centres which were opened in 1929. In 1937 they were placed under a single Government department, and child welfare became a social as well as a medical obligation of the Government, and lost its 'charity' implications. Important objectives include the integration of the home, establishment of foster homes for deserted children, adoption of orphans, pre-natal training for the mother, vocational training for her if she has to work, and aid from pregnancy until the child is six years old. A children's hospital is being opened in Mexico this year to serve as a centre for medico-social education, scientific investigation and the spread of pædiatric information.

Tuberculosis in Ei Salvador

THE March issue of the Boletin de la Oficina Sanitaria Panamericana contains an interesting paper by Dr. Rafael Vega Gomez, head of the Tuberculosis Department and ex-director of health, El Salvador, on the control of tuberculosis in his country. The campaign against the disease began in 1928 with the foundation of a National Tuberculosis Sanitorium, in which the number of beds has risen from 30 to 105. Previously the only accommodation for tuberculosis were some rooms in the Hospital Rosales of El Salvador. In 1931 the local Red Cross opened the first public dispensary and founded the National Anti-tuberculosis League. Five years later another dispensary was opened at Santa Ana. In 1939 the director of health created a Department of Tuberculosis and in 1940 opened a new dispensary where 14,000 examinations were made and 93 percent of the contacts were investigated, while 5,000 homes were visited. In 1938 the first census was taken to determine the amount of infections among school children in the capital ; 4,151 were examined. The Montoux and Pirquet tests were found to be positive in 32.8 percent of the five to six year olds, and in 62 percent of those aged 14-15. Similar results were obtained in Santa Ana in 1939. Of 12,000 apparently healthy persons at El Salvador in a population of 100,000, 1.42 percent showed signs of active tuberculosis. Recent figures showed a distribution of 22 percent, 64 percent and 14 percent among the minimal, moderate and advanced lesions respectively, which are very encouraging figures compared with those of 1932, when about 72 percent of the cases showed advanced lesions.

Public Health in Chile

THE March issue of the Boletin de la Oficina Sanitaria Panamericana contains a survey by Dr. Pedro Aguirre Cerda, president of Chile, on the present state of public health in the Republic. Since the end of 1939 the country has been free from epidemic disease with the exception of one or two sporadic cases of typhus. Whereas, in 1938, 70 percent of the conscripts serving in America contracted malaria, in 1940, there was not a single case. Special attention has been given to maternal and child welfare, and it is hoped that the present high infant mortality will be considerably reduced in two or three years. A scheme of medical attention is being planned to provide for mothers from the onset of pregnancy and for children from birth until they are able to work. The acute housing problem is being solved by providing hygienic and comfortable homes for workers at a low cost. Popular restaurants served approximately 2,000,000 meals to 1,000,000 persons in 1939, and 4,000,000 meals to 1,200,000 in 1940 ; 5,000,000 pesos have been allocated to aid deserted mothers and children as well as other handicapped persons.

On a Collection of Carboniferous Plants from Peru

In the course of a geological expedition to Peru in 1911 Mr. J. A. Douglas collected some fossil plants from coal-bearing strata on the south side of the peninsula of Paracas, a few miles south of the port of Pisco (lat. 13° 45′ S.). The plants, which are the property of the Geological Department of Oxford University, were handed to me for identification by Mr. Douglas, who also supplied information on the geology of the district. The specimens, though fragmentary and few in number, are worth recording, since this is the only known occurrence of fossiliferous Palæozoic rocks on the coast of Peru. Moreover, from a phytogeographical point of view, any fossil plants from South America are worthy of attention. The coal occurs in a series of greenish sandstones and grey and black carbonaceous shales, which have a north-easterly strike and dip about 25° south-eastwards. These are overlain unconformably on the neck of the peninsula by Tertiary sandstones and impure limestones. There is no definite stratigraphical evidence of the age of the coal-bearing beds, and the plants are therefore of special importance: in other districts the strata which are the chief source of Peruvian coal are Mesozoic in age. Mr. Douglas informed me that the rocks in question were described by Friedrich Fuchs, who published a note on them in 1900 in the ‘Boletin de Minas’ (Lima). Fuchs recorded the following species, and assigned the beds to the Upper Coal Measures:— Calamites Suckowi Brongniart. C. Sphenopteris Hartlebeni Dunker. W. Baiera

VI.—Plant Remains in Basalt, Mexico

When the members of the “Jorullo Excursion” of the Tenth International Geological Congress were in the city of Morelia, in Mexico, they visited the College of St. Nicholas (founded in 1540), in the buildings of which is the Museo Michoacano. One of the most interesting objects in the Museum in question is a piece of basaltic lava containing remains of maize, which has been described by Dr. M. M. Solórzano, the Curator of the Museum, in an article entitled “Breve noticia acerea de algunos productos volc´nicos de las immediaciones de esta ciudad” in the “Boletin de la Sociedad Michoacana de Geographia y Estadistica,” Tomo ii, Núm. 8, Morelia, Julio 15 de 1906, pp. 59, 60.