Acute Infections

 

Acute “Infections”

In this chapter we shall deal with what are commonly classified as “infectious diseases.” These are subdivided into “infectious diseases of known origin,” and “infectious diseases of unknown origin.” The first group are again divided into “diseases due to bacteria,” “diseases due to non-bacterial fungus,” “diseases due to protozoa” and “diseases due to metazoa.” The reader should know that of those said to be due to bacteria, some of them are not “absolutely established” to be of bacterial origin. Of those “known” to be “of bacterial origin,” the causative organism is “known” in but few. We shall ignore all these distinctions and deal with this group of symptom-complexes in alphabetical order.There is no infection, or contagion, in the sense now understood. Certain of these “infectious diseases” are said to provide “immunity” against future “attacks.” But when we reflect upon the fact that the great majority of mankind never develop a given so-called “disease” — diphtheria, or smallpox, for instance — it does not seem strange if the same person should not develop the same “disease” two or more times. More than one, sometimes three or more, “attacks” have been observed in all so-called “contagious diseases” and the assumption that one “attack” renders the victim immune is wholly gratuitous.

ANTHRAX

Definition: This “disease” is found largely among sheep and cattle, especially in those of Asia, Russia, and France. In man it is often called “wool sorter’s disease” and “rag picker’s disease.” It is claimed to be due to the bacillus anthracis, and is said to be transferred to man in meat or milk, or may be inhaled with dust.

Symptoms: Three forms are described: (1) the enteric form (“a rapidly fatal enteritis”) resulting from “infection” from meat or milk; (2) the bronchial form (“a fatal bronchitis”) resulting from inhalation of dust from wool or rags; (3) the pustular form (a malignant pustule” or “very bad form of boil”) resulting from “infection” of a scratch on the skin. The boil has a black center due to the death of the flesh and is often followed by “blood poisoning.”

Care of the Patient: Hygienists seem to have had no experience with this condition, but we may be sure that “infection” can occur only in those whose resistance has collapsed under enervation and toxemia.

ACTINOMYCOSIS

Definition: Actinomycosis is defined as “a chronic infectious disease chiefly of cattle,” caused by “the actinomyces or ray fungus, which forms translucent to opaque, grayish or yellow granules composed of radiating filaments with bulbous ends.” These are “probably ingested with food.”

Symptoms: Four types are described: (1) alimentary — there may be swelling of the face or tumor of the jaw, or the intestine or liver may be involved.

(2) Pulmonary — there is cough with pus and sometimes smelly sputum, irregular fever, loss of weight

(3) Cutaneous — skin tumors form and break down (suppurate), forming chronic ulcers.

(4) Cerebral — This form which presents symptoms resembling brain tumor or epilepsy, is rare.

Care of the Patient: No food should be given so long as acute symptoms persist. Rest in bed is essential. Open lesions should be cleansed thoroughly and kept clean.

 

BLACKWATER FEVER

See Malaria.

 

CHICKEN-POX (Varicella)

Definition: A dynamic biogony characterized by a vesicular eruption of the skin. Since “several attacks may occur” it is not claimed that one “attack” confers “immunity.”

Symptoms: Chicken-pox begins with a chill, vomiting, and pain in the back. The rash develops within the first twenty-four hours of fever. As a result, the biogony is mild. The rash begins as small red papules which develop into vesicles, but without, as in smallpox, the surrounding area of inflamed skin. In two days the fluid in the vesicles develops into pus. In two more days the pustules dry to. dark-brown crusts. These fall off without, as a rule, leaving a scar. Successive crops of the eruptions develop at intervals of from one to four days, so that unlike small-pox, all stages of the rash are present at the same time. The eruption seldom begins on the face, but begins, usually on the trunk, back and chest. The pustules never coalesce.

Complications: These are rare and result from feeding and drugging or other wrong care.

Etiology: Chicken-pox, like the other eruptive fevers, is a manifestation of protein poisoning: sepsis. It develops only in those who are in favorable condition.

Prognosis: All cases rapidly recover.

Care of the Patient: This condition should be handled the same as measles or smallpox. It is a mild biogony, does not last long, and is very comfortable under Hygienic Methods.

 

CHOLERA

Definition: A biogony characterized by vomiting, purging, spasms and griping pain. Asiatic or epidemic cholera has gone out of date in all countries where sanitation and hygiene has improved. In China and India, cholera is still prevalent.

Symptoms: Well-marked but favorable – cases are divided into three stages, as follows:

(1) Stage of Invasion: This name is based on the theory that cholera is caused by the “comma bacillus” of Koch. It usually begins with headache, diarrhea, rumbling noises in the intestines, and colic. Frequently these symptoms last a few days and subside: such cases are named cholerine.

(2) Stage of Collapse: The diarrhea becomes more marked,the evacuations become copious, lose their feculent character, take on a rice-water appearance, and are discharged forcibly but without pain. Vomiting soon develops, the vomitus resembling the stools. There is unquenchable thirst, severe cramps in the muscles of legs, thighs, arms and abdomen. The surface is cold and covered with a clammy sweat; the breath is cool, the voice is husky and finally reduced to a whisper, breathing is quickened, the pulse becomes progressively feeble, the body is livid and shriveled, the features are ached, sometimes distorted, the eyes sunken. Temperature in the armpits fall, though there may be fever internally and the urine is scanty or suppressed. Consciousness usually persists until the end, when coma develops. This stage lasts from a few hours to two days.

(3) Stage of Reaction: In this stage the symptoms gradually grow better, the stools become less frequent, temperature returns to normal, more urine is excreted and convalescence is soon established.

Cholera Typhoid is the term given to those cases where moderate fever, a dry brown tongue, muttering, delirium, coma and usually death follow the collapse stage instead of reaction.

Cholera Sicca is the term applied to cases in which the intoxication is so overwhelming that the patient dies within a few hours after the first symptoms appear and before the saving diarrhea has developed.

Complications: Nephritis, pneumonia, pleurisy, parotitis, ulceration of the cornea, croupous inflammation of the throat and fauces, abscesses and local gangrene are the chief complications.

Etiology: Enervation, toxemia, and insanitary surroundings are the chief causes.

Prognosis: The Hygienic System received its baptism in cholera and proved its great effectiveness. In the aged, very young, debilitated and intemperate the death rate is very high. If the body is not forced to expend too much fluid in its efforts to flush away the source of poisoning, recovery will always occur.

Care of the Patient: Fasting, rest, heat and an abundance of pure water are the chief needs. Great thirst is due to loss of body fluids.

 

CORYZA

Definition: Coryza (or colds in the head) is an acute catarrhal inflammation of the nasal cavities sometimes extending to the pharynx, upper respiratory tract, Eustachian tubes and accessory nasal sinuses.

Symptoms: It begins with chilliness, muscular soreness, general discomfort, fullness in the head and sneezing. Obstruction of the nasal chambers causes the patient to breathe through his mouth. At first there is no excretion, but in twenty-four or forty-eight hours a watery discharge is set up which later becomes muco-purulent. Slight fever accompanies.

Complications: The inflammation may extend to the frontal sinuses (sinusitis), Eustachian tubes, pharynx (pharyngitis), larynx (laryngitis), and bronchi (bronchitis). Frequent colds may lead to chronic rhinitis.

Etiology: Colds, or rhinitis, represent processes of vicarious elimination. They are not caused by cold feet, damp air, night air, exposure ‘to cold, eating your cereals out of a damp bowl, exposure to heat, etc., nor are they caused by germs.

The two great causes of colds are repletion and exhaustion. Anything and everything that tends to tax and lower the vital or nervous powers, impairs digestion, checks elimination and tends to bring on “disease.”

Repletion or plethora (overeating with surcharged blood vessels) tends to overtax the functions of life, poison the body and necessitates a process of compensatory elimination, which is “disease.”

Eating when exhausted, when worried, over-excited, or under any similar circumstance, when the digestive powers are low, also poisons the body and calls for an unusual house-cleaning process. Excesses of sugar, starch and milk are the chief causes of colds and her catarrhal conditions.

We do not “catch” colds; we develop them within ourselves. The cold, per se, is a life saving measure, a process of elimination.

Many so-called “diseases” begin with a cold and others develop after recurring colds, and this has given rise to the theory that colds prepare the way for other “diseases”; that they weaken the body and prepare it for “attack” by some other and more virulent “disease.” Nothing can be farther from the truth. If the prevailing theory that colds and other so-called “diseases” are due to germs is correct, there seems to be no reason why the less virulent germs (of colds) must first break down the resistance of the body before the more virulent germs (of infantile paralysis, measles, tuberculosis etc.) can cause “disease” therein.

Instead of laying us liable to “other diseases”, colds tend just the other way. That condition of the body that makes the cold, or a series of colds, necessary, may and often does, due to the persistence of its causes, demand other forms of eliminating crises (“disease”) to remedy.

But tuberculosis no more develops out of a cold than the hair on a man’s face develops out of the hair of his head. A cold may be and usually is part of an acute “disease,” like measles or scarlet fever, and it may be the first part of this marvelous process of systemic purification to develop.

Prognosis: The duration is from a few days to two weeks. Indeed, some spontaneously abort in a few hours. A cold that persists for two weeks is badly cared for.

Care of the Patient: It is only because the cold may be the early symptom of a formidable “disease” that this condition could receive immediate care. A “disease” cared for properly from the start never becomes serious, nor results fatally.Whether it is a “common cold” or a early symptom of typhoid or spinal menengitis, the patient should be put to bed, all food stopped, except perhaps some orange juice, where there is no fever, and kept warm. That is all there is to the treatment of any acute so-called “disease” — rest, fasting, warmth. Rest includes quiet and physical comfort. Fresh air is always imperative. No common cold can last long when the patient is cared for in this manner.

 

DENGUE

Definition: Called also breakbone fever and dandy fever, this is a febrile condition confined almost entirely to hot climates.

Symptoms: These appear suddenly with discomfort, chilliness, headache, intense pain in the muscles and joints and high fever. Fever rises rapidly to a maximum of 104 to 105 F. in a few hours. The skin and conjunctiva are congested, the pulse rapid, urine scanty, the superficial lymph glands are enlarged, the joints are painful, tender, and slightly swollen. Mild delirium sometimes develops. In three to four days sweating occurs, the temperature falls, pain abates, and the patient becomes comparatively comfortable, though weak. This remission lasts one or two days to be followed by a return of all the original symptoms, though in less severe form and of shorter duration. A roseolar eruption usually develops during the second period of fever. After one or two days, desquamation (peeling) follows.

Complications are rare. Hemorrhages from the mucous membranes occasionally occur.

Prognosis: Recovery is the rule. Convalescence is sometimes slow, the soreness of the joints persisting for a long time.

Care of the Patient: Fasting, rest and warmth are all these cases require. After convalescence begins, great care is needed in feeding and in conserving the patient’s strength.

 

DIPHTHERIA

Definition: Diphtheria is a symptom-complex characterized by an exudation thrown out on the mucous membrane of the pharynx, tonsils, larynx, and sometimes in the trachea and bronchial tubes.

Symptoms: The patient seldom feels as ill as in acute tonsilitis. The fever is seldom high and soon falls to normal. Where the poisoning is intense the temperature may run to 102 and 103 F. The throat is not very sore although the tonsils may be greatly enlarged. In some cases which suffer most severely there is little membrane, some even have no fever. In others the temperature is sub-normal. These cases are especially dangerous; the lack of fever indicating a lack of reactive power. To express it differently: temperature is so low because pan-toxemia has so overwhelmed the nervous system that only a feeble reaction is possible. Diphtheria of the nose, of the eyes and around a recent wound may cause no serious feeling of discomfort.Diphtheria begins with fever, chilly feelings, pains in the limbs back, headache and discomfort. The throat is not very red and tonsils are not greatly swollen. The glands in the neck enlarge and the face becomes an ashen gray. The patch of white membrane enlarges and extends beyond the tonsil. The membrane may grow rapidly and extend over the soft palate to the posterior wall of the fine bronchi. The membrane may even extend through the Eustachian tube into the middle ear, along the nose into the nasal sinuses and sometimes it extends down the oesophagus into the stomach. Under the membrane there is death of tissue and there follows sloughing. The “disease” is self-limited and after ten days the membrane loosens and falls off in shreds.Within recent years medical men have recognized that “membranous croup” is diphtheria and these cases are now quarantined. When the writer was younger, cases of membranous croup were not quarantined and no one ever “caught” the “disease” from these cases. An unquarantined case did not produce an epidemic.”Membranous croup” is the worst form of diphtheria. These cases seldom appear to be very ill. For two or three days there is a rough, croupy cough which becomes a little more croupy each after-noon and evening, but wearing off somewhat in the forepart of the night and in the morning. The child’s breathing is not affected, he has an appetite – and there is usually little uneasiness on the part of parents. Then, suddenly, the child almost suffocates. He tosses about on the bed, sits up and struggles in various ways in an effort to breathe. He becomes blue. In severe cases the child suffocates unless relieved by intubation or tracheotomy. In the milder cases the paroxysms are soon over, but they sometimes recur later.

Complications: Under regular medical care, acute myocarditis, severe nephritis, and bronchopneumonia are common. The first two, at least, are resultants of anti-toxin. Various forms of paralysis, especially of the throat and eye muscles and of the limbs develop as sequalae in about one fifth of medically treated cases. Paralysis is often the result of anti-toxin, although we cannot always attribute this to the anti-toxin, for it sometimes occurs in cases which have had no anti-toxin.Anti-toxin does not cure diphtheria and toxin-anti-toxin does not prevent it. Both these foreign proteins are responsible for many deaths in both the well and the sick and for much other injury short of death.

Etiology: Diphtheria develops in fat, soft, sleek, “well fed” children that are so generally admired as “pictures of health.” These children are chronically ill, are predisposed to the, development of severe acute biogonies, and, if they reach maturity, supply the greater portion of the cases of tuberculosis. Children who spend most of their time out of doors, are thinly clad, sleep in cold, well-ventilated rooms, have a spare diet and are not pampered, do not develop diphtheria. The symptom-complex of diphtheria starts with enervation which checks secretion and excretion. Inhibition of excretion produces toxemia; checked secretion produces indigestion — fermentation and putrefaction. Such a child will suffer from putrescent poisoning and may at any time, develop scarlet fever, measles, smallpox, diphtheria or other severe protein-poisoning crisis. Trall, Page, Tilden, Weger and others have shown the putrescent basis of diphtheria.

Prognosis: The  care of diphtheria cases is done by hygienic methods that, the “disease” has “invariably responded in the same even and consistent manner.” There is little danger of this formidable disease, which often desolates the family circle of all the little ones, terminating fatally, if this plan of treatment is thoroughly carried out — unless it is a very frail and scrofulous child.

Care of the Patient: No food of any kind should be given. In croupy cases, whether it is or is not membranous croup, it is well to stop all food the instant the first sign of trouble (the cough) shows. These cases may stand some chance of recovery if proper care is taken before the membrane spreads to such an extent that breathing is made impossible.

Put the child to bed in a well ventilated room. If it is winter, place a hot water bottle at his feet.

Drinking should be discouraged. Swallowing tends to break up the membrane and carry it into the stomach. Small water enemas, given after the bowels have been thoroughly cleaned out, must take the place of drink.

The throat should not be gargled. No sprays or washes of any kind are to be employed.

The child should be placed in a position so that everything will well out of the mouth. Place him on his right side so that he leans well forward and face down. If the child is permitted on the back, the secretion tends to run down the throat and the trachea and stomach. This must be avoided. If he tires of lying on one side he may be placed on the other, or he may be placed on his face.

“Positively nothing is to be put into the child’s ‘mouth; not a drop of water, for swallowing must be avoided. The act of swallowing breaks the membranous protection. The old treatment of gargling and swabbing, was barbarous and, for intelligent people, criminal.

“Thirst must be controlled by frequent enemas of water. Nourishment is not life-saving, as many think, but positively disease and death-provoking. * * * From the foregoing explanation, it is obvious how dangerous is the old time practice of swabbing and gargling the throat. No wonder the mortality was great, and no wonder the anti-toxin treatment has proved such a success. Its success however, has been of a negative character — on the order of the lesser evil.

If the anti-toxin has any influence — if it is not inert — it certainly must make a change in the nervous system; and this change must be reconciled and an equilibrium or readjustment take place, before a normal healing process can be resumed.” —

 

Impaired Health

These children, should be left alone and not allowed to talk. No questions should be asked them which require answers.

No drugs of any kind are to be tolerated. These lessen the chance of recovery.

Although comparatively few who come in contact with this “disease” develop it, it is considered highly contagious and, due to the contagion-superstition, these cases are quarantined. Food must not be given until the throat is healed. Then fruit juices may be given for two days and then a gradual return to the normal diet.

Death in this “disease” results from suffocation, and from mal-treatment. The exudation into the wind-pipe, with the subsequent formation of the false membrane, chokes the patient to death. In so-called membranous croup this is seen at its worst.

If this can be prevented there is no danger from the “disease.” If the above methods are not sufficient to control the exudate in any given case, a certain amount of drugless suppression will form the lesser of two evils. Cold cloths around the neck and ice held in the mouth and applied directly to the inflamed parts will suppress the inflammation and exudate. Plenty of fresh air and sunshine should be had during convalescense.

GASTRODUODENITIS

Definition: Gastroduodenitis is a catarrhal inflammation of the stomach and duodenum.

Symptoms: Colic, nausea, loss of appetite, vomiting and sometimes diarrhea are the chief symptoms.

Etiology: Carbohydrate poisoning added to a previous enervation and toxemia is the cause.

Care of the Patient: Fasting and rest. This disease, prevalent in endemic form some years ago  responds quickly to a no-eating regime after medication and other methods had failed.

 

EPIDEMIC JAUNDICE (Well’s Disease)

Definition: This is a rare acute jaundice which occurs in epidemics and develops most commonly in males between the ages of fifteen and thirty,

Symptoms: High fever (103 – 104 F.) develops suddenly with discomfort and muscular pains, slight jaundice, enlargement of the liver and spleen, albuminuria and marked nervous symptoms — headache, dizziness, delirium and somnolence. Coma may sometimes develop.

Etiology: It is supposed to be caused by eating spoiled meat or drinking contaminated water. Only toxemic subjects would develop the condition from these causes.

Prognosis: Recovery is the rule. Convalescence is often slow.

Care of the Patient: See acute catarrhal jaundice under “diseases” of the digestive tract.

 

EPIDEMIC POLIOMYELITIS

Definition: Known also as acute anterior poliomyelitis and acute infantile spinal paralysis, or infantile paralysis, this condition develops chiefly in young children, rarely in adults. Anatomically it is characterized by inflammation of the gray matter of the spinal cord with destruction of the nerve cells in the anterior horns, and clinically by fever and rapid atrophic paralysis of various muscles.

Symptoms: It begins with slight fever (101 – 103 F.) restlessness, headache, pain in the back and limbs, and muscular soreness. In a few cases there is vomiting or diarrhea, and occasionally convulsions. In the course of a day or two a flaccid paralysis develops. The legs are especially likely to be involved, but all four limbs, the trunk, the lower limbs, one limb only, a group of muscles, or the respiratory muscles may be involved. The paralysis reaches its maximum in a few hours or days, then begins to improve, in many cases very little paralysis remaining at the end of a few weeks or months, in other cases much paralysis remaining. Complete recovery is more frequent than is generally known. Where paralysis persists, permanent deformity often ensues from the failure of growth in the paralyzed parts and the over contraction of the un-antagonized muscles.

The paralysis may be due to changes in the brain or in the spinal cord. Several forms are described, but these relate to location and not to the actual cause or causes of the affection. In addition to the spinal form there are (1) abortive cases, in which the constitutional symptoms are unattended by paralysis and complete recovery occurs in a few days: (2) meningitic cases, in which the early symptoms closely simulate those of epidemic cerebrospinal meningitis; (3) bulbar cases, in which the nuclear centers in the medulla oblongata are involved; and (4) polyneuritis cases, in which pain in the limbs and general hyperesthesia are for a few days the most outstanding symptoms.

Etiology: Those demanding a unitary, specific cause say poliomyelitis is due to a “minute anaerobic organism,” but care based on this premise is often worse than the organism itself.

Infantile paralysis is divided into intra-uterine and post-natal classes. Cases developing before birth are due to injuries and poisons. Doubtless most of these cases are due to injuries received at birth. Cases developing after birth result from infection, either from gastro-intestinal decomposition or from vaccination. Epidemics of poliomyelitis develop at the end of each summer when children are vaccinated. A plethoric state, due to over-eating is described by medical men as a “well-nourished” state. They say that acute epidemic poliomyelitis “appears in children previously well nourished.” Such “well-nourished” states are commonly accompanied by intestinal sepsis.

Prognosis: Unless the initial symptoms are very severe or the respiratory muscles are affected, the prognosis as regards life is good.

The death rate under regular care ranges from 5 to 30 per cent. In all cases that live, much of the paralysis disappears and occasionally the improvement is so marked that the usefulness of the affected parts is not seriously impaired. Undoubtedly many cases of death and permanent disability are due to the drugs and serums used in treating the patient in its early or acute stages. I have never seen paralysis develop in a case under drugless treatment of whatever nature.

Care of the Patient: Rest in bed, with plenty of fresh air in the room is essential. Stop all food until all convulsions, twitchings

, spasmodic movements, spastic contractions, fever, etc., are gone. After this, feed the child a fruit diet for a week, then feed it normally, Cases that are left with muscular and nervous incoordination require muscular and nervous re-education in the form of educational gymnastics, for which see Vol. IV of this series. The employment of the “iron lung” in cases of chest paralysis is only a spectacular grandstand play that robs the family of much wealth.

 

ERYSIPELAS

Definition: This is an acute inflammation of the skin and subcutaneous tissues, accompanied with high fever.

Symptoms: Erysipelas may begin with slight fever, chilliness, discomfort, and the tingling in the affected part or, as in many cases, it begins with a sudden chill, followed by pain in the head and limbs and a high, irregular fever — the temperature reaching 104 or 105 F., in twenty-four hours. The pulse is full and rapid, the tongue heavily coated, appetite is absent, the urine scanty and often slightly albuminous, the bowels constipated. In severe cases the “typhoid condition,” manifested by delirium, subsultus tendinum, a dry brown tongue, etc., often develops.

Locally the inflammation usually begins in the vicinity of the nose, and spreads upward and laterally over the head to the neck, where it frequently stops. The first feeling the patient will have is one of stiffness, with gradually, increasing sensitiveness. The affected part is red, swollen and tense and frequently ends in a sharply defined ridge beyond which projections may be felt advancing into the subcutaneous tissue. The surface of the inflamed patch is at first smooth and glazed, but later becomes studded with minute vesicles or blebs. The blebs (blisters) break, discharging a serum-like fluid.

If the condition is severe, the swelling will be very rapid, and the part first affected will be the first to lose the redness and swelling. If it spreads only over the forehead, it advances apparently with an elevated ridge; or there is a sharp line of demarcation between the affected and unaffected regions. If the swelling spreads over much of the head there may be delirium. The glands of the neck become slightly enlarged. If the ears become involved the inflammation may spread to the bone.

Brain and meningeal symptoms are common in depleted subjects — those whose “resistance” has been broken down by the use of tea, coffee, alcohol and sensual habits.

Etiology: In most cases a slight wounding of the skin seems essential to the development of erysipelas, though, in some cases, no injury appears to be required. Toxemia and excessive animal protein lay the foundation for this condition. Sepsis from any source may start up the inflammation in susceptible individuals. A wound that does not drain becomes septic and may develop erysipelas..

Prognosis:  erysipelas is “readily checked without pursuing its usual round-trip course. Fever absent on third or fourth day, no abscesses or secondary infections.”

Care of the Patient: Externally, the strictest cleanliness is of the utmost importance. Bathing with warm water (no antiseptics) at frequent intervals will answer the purposes of cleanliness.

Positively no food but water is to be given. Keep visitors out of the sick room and allow quiet, peaceful rest. Have the room well ventilated and keep the patient warm.

 

FEBRICULA

Definition: This is a short, acute feverish condition without definite lesions. It is also called ephemeral fever and simple continued fever.

Symptoms: Any fever that develops, lasts but a day and ends, leaving no sequels, may be called febricula. Sudden chilliness, headache, discomfort, and fever, which may attain to 1020 or 1030 F., with flushed face, loss of appetite, constipation, scanty, high colored urine, coated tongue, full and rapid pulse, are the common symptoms. Herpes (fever blisters) is frequently seen on the lips. The biogony lasts from one day to two days, ending either by crysis or lysis.

Etiology: In some cases there is nothing to account for the condition except a little indigestion. Excessive heat, undue excitement, etc., are frequent causes. It is seen chiefly in young and sensitive individuals.

Care of the Patient: “There is nothing to do for it, except to, stop feeding,” says Tilden.

Fever in Children: Fever means poisoning (not drug poisoning), usually decomposition in the intestine. It means there is a mass of rotting food in the food tube poisoning the body.

It means something else — namely; nutrition is suspended until the poisoning is overcome. It means that no more food should le given to the child until all fever and other symptoms are gone, It means that nothing but water, as demanded by thirst, should be given to the patient.

So long as there is fever and diarrhea, no food, of whatever character, can be of any use to the child. If the child appears to be hungry, it is thirst. Give it water, for food will not relieve thirst.

If food is given to the feverish infant it usually vomits it up immediately; nature refusing food as fast as well meaning, but misguided parents and attendants force it upon the child.

Bear in mind that the food decomposed and poisoned the child because the child’s digestive power had been greatly impaired and that to give it more food, under such conditions, is only to add to the poisoning.

The fever will last until the poisons have been eliminated and the decomposing food has been voided. Fever, vomiting and purging are nature’s methods of getting rid of the poison and when these cases are fasted and not fed, such troubles soon end. There is no danger in them. Feeding and drugging are the elements of danger.

Never permit your child to be drugged and do not permit the physician to reduce (suppress) its fever.

When animals, young and old, become sick they instinctively refrain from eating. Warmth, quiet and fasting, with a little water, are all they want. When they take nourishment, it is a sure sign that they are recovering. They eat but little at first and gradually eat more as they grow better. They never worry about calories or protein requirements, either.

Infants call for warmth, quiet and fasting, plus water. They will take nourishment if they are not given water, because they are thirsty. But they are made sicker each time they take it.

The body does not digest and absorb food when digestion is suspended and the membranes of the stomach and intestine are exuding matter instead of absorbing it. It is exuding fluid to aid in expelling the mass of putresence in the food tube and to protect the walls of the tube and any irritated surface from the irritation. Sometimes nature even rejects water, expelling it by vomiting, as often as it is forced down. How foolish, in such cases, to continue to force food and drugs on the patient and water into his stomach. Nature is trying to protect herself by this vomiting. She even guards herself against water by creating a bad taste in the mouth that causes the patient to refuse water.

 

GLANDERS

Definition: This condition is seen chiefly in horses, but sometimes develops in man. It is characterized by the development of nodules resembling those of miliary tuberculosis, in the skin or mucous membrane of the nose or mouth. When the local lesion is in the nares the condition is called glanders; when in the skin, farcy.Symptoms: Acute glanders begins with constitutional febrile symptoms and local inflammatory signs. In two or three days nodules appear on the membrane of the nose and ulcerate, with a mucopurulent discharge. Sometimes these nodules become necrotic adding a foulness to the discharge. The lymph nodes of the neck are enlarged and an eruption – papules which become pustules – appears over the face and joints. Chronic glanders resembles a chronic cold with ulcer of the membrane of the nose. It may last for months.

Acute farcy presents the same constitutional symptoms — fever, discomfort, etc. — as other so-called infections, with necrosis of the nodules. Nodules known as farcy buds form along the lymphatic channels and suppurate. Purulent collections may form in the joints and muscles.

Chronic farcy manifests as tumors in the skin of the extremities, which suppurate. There are almost no constitutional symptoms, the process is local, the inflammation is slight and the condition may persist for years.

Etiology: The bacillus mallei is accused of causing glanders. It is supposed to be derived from “infected” horses. We may be sure that, whatever part the bacillus may play in causation, it would be powerless in those of pure blood and full nerve force. Toxemia is basic.

Prognosis: This condition is extremely rare in man and I cannot find any records of any cases cared for by hygienic methods. Medical prognoses run: acute glanders — “death takes place in eight to ten days”; chronic glanders — “some recover”; acute farcy —”death often occurs in ten to fifteen days”; chronic farcy — “death may occur from acute glanders or pyemia.

“Care of the Patient: Strict cleanliness is absolutely essential. No food should be given during the acute stage. Sunbaths are indicated for the chronic stage. A diet of fruits and vegetables with no animal foods should be fed. The local lesion should be thoroughly cleansed.

 

GLANDULAR FEVER

Definition: A rare affection of infancy and childhood characterized by pronounced inflammatory swelling of the lymph glands, particularly of the neck.

Symptoms: The condition begins with chilliness, headache and general discomfort, followed by moderate fever, slight reddening of the throat and tonsils and pronounced inflammatory swelling of the lymph glands, most frequently of the deep neck glands, behind or beneath the sternocleidomastoid. Rarely the glands suppurate.

Complications: These are few and rare. Nephritis is the most common of these.

Etiology: Putrescent poisoning from gastro-intestinal putrefaction superadded to toxemia.

Prognosis: The condition lasts ten days to four weeks. Recovery is the rule.

Care of the Patient: This condition should be handled as all other acute processes; i.e. rest, warmth, fasting during the acute stage; fruits and vegetables during convalescence.

 

GONORRHEA

Definition: An acute “self-limited” inflammation of the male urethra (specific urethritis) or of the female vagina and adjacent parts, arising from putrescent infection.

Symptoms:

Male: Two days to two or three weeks after infection, a feeling of uneasiness or an itching is felt at the mouth of the urethra. This feeling increases and merges into pain, particularly while urinating. Soon there appears a discharge of creamy consistency, of a yellowish color and of a thready, slightly adhesive character, which dries upon the clothing and bed linen. This may glue together the lips of the urethra, obstructing urination.

The inflammation and pain, particularly upon urination increase, the lips of the meatus become red and swollen and, where the urine is highly acid, the redness and, swelling increase until rawness and excoriation of the mucous membrane occur. In such cases systemic infection is a possibility. If the urethral passage is normally very narrow, the pain is likely to be especially great.

The fore-skin frequently becomes oedematous, the oedema sometimes becoming so great that it is all but impossible to force the fore-skin back. This interferes with cleanliness making it necessary to wash out the accumulations under the prepuce by means of a syringe.

The swelling and irritation of the urethra extend backward towards the bladder so that in five or six days general urethritis is established. Pain is increased by urination, by erections and by crossing the legs. At this stage erections are quite frequent, particularly while lying down and are very distressing. In very severe cases and in nervous and irritable patients, the erections become extremely painful and obdurate — the penis becoming hard, very sensitive and often more or less curved: “chordee.”

The discharge is often streaked with blood and, in some severe cases, the blood flows freely. The discharge, beginning as a whitish to yellowish cream-like mixture of pus and mucus, often becomes greenish. In the acute stage it emits an odor resembling that of decayed codfish ‘and, where cleanliness is neglected, becomes exceedingly offensive.

Female: The distressing symptoms of gonorrhea in men are largely due to the obstruction of the urinary passage. Possessed of a larger and shorter urethral passage the female suffers less than the male with an equal severity of inflammation. In the vagina there may be no suffering at all, or there may be slight irritation and pain.

Urethral Gonorrhea in the female presents symptoms very nearly like those of urethritis in the male, except that they are less violent.

Gonorrheal Vulvitis is gonorrhea of the clitoris and its prepuce, the vestibule, the greater or lesser lips and adjacent structures. These alone may be affected. The inflammation may be limited to the mucous membrane of these parts, or it may reach into the glands and tissues invested by these membranes. In some cases the skin adjacent to the genital organs is involved. In fat women erythomatous inflammation of the skin often develops.

Intense heat, redness, swelling, and itching attend this condition. In some cases erosive inflammation develops. Strong sexual desires are present in the early stages with many sufferers. Walking greatly increases the pain of the inflamed parts. Some patients often suffer while sitting. Even where no urethritis exists the discharge of urine may be painful, as the last drops are diffused over the inflamed vulva.

Vaginal and Uterine Gonorrhea is an extension of vulvitis. The vagina may be affected throughout it whole length or only that portion adjacent to the vulva or to the neck of the uterus.

When the uterus is involved the discharge is of a mucous character, and passes from the vagina in thready masses, having a much greater tenacity than when the vagina only is involved.

The acute stage of gonorrhea varies from one to three weeks. The symptoms gradually abate, the discharge becomes less, the erections cease, the inflammation subsides, and recovery follows. Gonorrhea is a “self-limited disease” running a variable course of four to seven weeks, cases rarely recover in less than four weeks and rarely run longer than seven weeks — with or without treatment.

Chronic Gonorrhea: This is a condition described in medical works in which there is no pain and perhaps the only symptom is a single drop of matter which is seen in the morning or at other times if the glans penis is pressed before urinating.

We doubt that it is gonorrhea. If there is such a thing as chronic gonorrhea it must endure in maltreated cases or in patients whose habits are not favorable to recovery.

Complications: Medical writers list a whole collection of complications of gonorrhea such as gleet, stricture of the urethra, prostatitis, sterility, heart disease (pericarditis), “gonorrheal rheumatism,” “blood-poisoning,” peritonitis, various abscesses, “three quarters of the cases admitted to the wards for female trouble,” “many more than half of the cases of blindness of infants,” orchitis, and many other conditions.

Gonorrheal septicemia and pyemia represent very serious conditions and can occur where absorption takes place. Death is not uncommon in such cases.

Thousands of women are operated on yearly for “female diseases” resulting from gonorrhea or wrong treatment therefore. Pus tubes, chronic inflammation of the womb, pelvic abscesses, etc., are not uncommon complications in medically treated cases.

Abscesses in the male often form and burrow in such a way as to make their way into the bladder, the pus showing up in the urine. Gonorrheal infection of the testes is often followed by gonorrheal rheumatism, a very intractable condition.

Since these complications are never met with in cases cared for hygienically, and since all the complications we have seen were in medically treated cases, we are convinced that they are the results of medical treatment.

Etiology: Absorption of septic matter through an abrasion in the mucosa of the urethra or vagina. All so-called “specific infections” are septic or toxic infections. Sepsis is the infecting agent. “Gonorrheal infection” is assumed to come only from a case of gonorrhea. How, then, did the first case of gonorrhea develop? If one case can develop without a prior case, cannot millions do likewise? Gonorrhea is often seen in children and sometimes no possible source of infection can be found.

Prognosis: Recovery occurs in four to six weeks. Women tend to recover earlier than men.

Care of the Patient: There is no other so-called “disease” which so quickly and surely grows worse when indiscretions are indulged, or that so quickly responds to hygienic care. Every symptom may be made better or worse at will by changing the diet, or by other factors. So true is this that when a patient is not progressing we may be absolutely sure that he is not carrying out instructions.

Perfect cleanliness with a sensible dressing to permit drainage are essential. The affected parts should be washed several times daily. Frequent urination will keep the urethra cleansed. Injections of drugs are to be avoided. Douches for women are not advisable.

Dressings of the penis, to catch the discharge, should be loose and should hang from the hips. No obstruction to drainage should be permitted. The immediate employment of the fast in the acute stage is important. If a fast cannot be taken a diet of fruit or fruit juices may be employed. The fast should last through the whole of the acute stage, preferably until there is no longer a trace of the discharge.

the diet should be exceedingly simple and very abstemious. Flesh food of all kinds, milk and all of its products, with seasonings and condiments of all sorts, should be prohibited. During the stage of acute inflammation, but little food of any kind should be taken.”

Hard work, walking, horseback riding, sports, etc., have a tendency to increase the suffering and prolong the trouble. Rest hastens recovery and lessens suffering. Sexual rest is imperative. Impossible during the acute stage, intercourse should not be indulged at any stage prior to complete recovery. Thoughts of sex that tend to arouse desire should be avoided.

INFLUENZA

Definition: Influenza is a blanket term which, like the terms “syphilis” and “rheumatism,” is applied to many different symptom-complexes, ranging all the way from a cold to pneumonia, typhoid fever, sleeping sickness and cerebro-spinal meningitis. The term should be dropped from our language. It is defined as “a contagious epidemic catarrhal fever with great prostration and varying symptoms and sequels; grippe, or La Grippe.”

Symptoms: “Influenza” usually begins with fever, sometimes with a chill. The symptoms are those of a severe cold. Indeed we are told that “the difference between influenza and the ordinary cold is the tendency of the former to continue long after ‘the time for a hard cold to disappear.” The patient complains of being very weak and in some cases the weakness runs on for weeks and the catarrh, which is always pronounced, hangs on continuously. In pronounced cases the mucous membrane is involved from the nose through the entire bronchial tubes; the lungs often become engorged. Pneumonia and pleurisy often develop. Delirium and prostration are often present, where the bronchial tubes and lungs are involved. The so-called nervous forms of influenza are characterized by headache, much pain in the joints and prostration. Other cases “develop in a manner similar to that of typhoid fever.” “Intestinal influenza” is marked by much fever and by such “complications” as pericarditis, endocarditis, septicemia, peritonitis, etc.

Complications: Delirium, spasm, peritonitis, pneumonia, pleurisy, heart trouble, sleeping sickness, etc., develop in those cases that are fed and drugged.

Etiology: The different forms of so-called catarrhal fevers — colds, influenza etc. — are one and the same, differing only in degree. Enervation and toxemia complicated by much intestinal decomposition are the causes. The most enervated and toxic have the severest cases and in this class is the highest mortality. Sensualists have the worst cases.

Prognosis:   the care of “influenza” cases with hygienic methods: “happy results have been obtained, with rapid decline of all symptoms and abatement of temperature usually within three days. No pneumonia or sequelae have complicated any case.” No deaths have occurred under hygienic care.

Care of the Patient: As soon as the first acute symptom appears the patient should stop all eating and go to bed and remain there. Warmth, rest and fasting are the needs and the only needs.

 

KALA-AZAR

Definition: This is known as dum-dum fever, or tropical splenomegaly and is characterized by a rapid enlargement of the liver and spleen. The condition is frequent in India and other parts of the Orient and is attributed to a parasite — Leishmania donovani.

Symptoms: High fever with rapid enlargement of the liver and spleen mark the beginning of kala-azar. The fever usually subsides in from two to four weeks, but recurrences are the rule and, finally, a low, continued fever may develop. Marked weakness, emaciation, and anemia develop, the skin acquires a grayish color and general edema frequently develops. In three-fourths of the cases the skin extends below the navel.

Prognosis: The mortality of 96 per cent under medical care is probably due to “quinine in large doses, and arsenic” which “are believed to be of service in treatment.”

Care of the Patient: See Malaria.

 

LEPROSY

Definition: An affection characterized by granulomatous formations in various parts of the body, more particularly in the skin, mucous membranes, and nerves. It is also called lepra and Elephantiasis Graecorum. In ancient times the term leprosy was applied to a wide variety of skin affections that are now designated by other terms.

Symptoms: Early symptoms, consisting of headache, discomfort, irregular periods of fever, and pains in the joints, are sometimes seen. Two clinical forms are recognized:

The Nodular type is characterized by the development of large or small nodular elevations of a dusky-red color, in various parts of the body, especially on the face, the extensor surfaces of the elbows and knees, and hands. After a time these break down, forming ulcers which do not readily heal, or they are transformed into dense scar-tissue, thus producing unsightly deformities. The mucous membrane of the eyes, nose and throat may also be involved.

The Anesthetic type is characterized by lancinating (darting) pains and areas of hypersthesia (excess feeling) followed by the appearance of yellowish macules, which spread peripherally and finally become anesthetic. Sooner or later such tropic changes as milk. white patches (lepra alba), areas of dark brown pigmentation, bulbus (vesicular) eruptions, loss of hair, muscular atrophy, mutilatlng ulcers, and a one by one disappearance of the phalanges through disintegration and absorption (lepra mutilano). In advanced cases the skin of the face becomes irregularly thickened and nodular (leontiasis), the ears become leathery, the facial hair falls out, the eye lids become everted, and the hands and feet become crippled and deformed.

These two types of leprosy are often mixed.

Etiology: Leprosy belongs largely to tropical and sub-tropical countries. Toxemia and intestinal putrescence are undoubtedly basic causes, but there would appear to be complicating causes superadded to these. The bacillus lepra is claimed to cause this condition.

Prognosis: This “disease” is very chronic, often persisting for twenty or more years and is occasionally “arrested.” Spontaneous recoveries occur.

Care of the Patient: Isolation is practiced although leprosy is said to be “only mildly contagious.” Isolation for such long periods undoubtedly works against recovery.

Scrupulous cleanliness, rest, fasting, and a fruit and vegetable diet are the great needs in these cases. Sun bathing is of distinct value.

 

MALARIA

Definition: A biogony characterized by enlargement of the spleen, fever, with periodic intermissions or remissions, chills and fever; known also as chills and fever, fever and ague, and paludism. It is common to divide malaria into five forms, as follows:

Intermittent Malarial Fever: This is characterized by paroxysms of fever occurring at definite periods, each paroxysm consisting of a cold, a hot, and a sweating stage.

The Cold stage is marked by lassitude, aching in the limbs, and great chilliness and pinched features, blue lips, and a cold, rough surface coexisting with a high rectal temperature (105 to 106 F.) Vomiting may occur. The chill may last from a few minutes to an hour or more.

The Hot stage begins when the surface temperature begins gradually to rise so that the skin becomes hot, the face flushed, the eyes injected, and the pulse full and rapid. The axillary (armpits) temperature may rise to 105 or 107 F. Severe pain in the head, back, and limbs, is accompanied by intense thirst. The urine is dark and scanty. This stage usually persists for one to five hours.

The Sweating stage marks the subsidence of the hot stage. The fever gradually subsides, the pains grow less, free perspiration follows and the urine becomes abundant. Within an hour or two the paroxysm is over and the patient falls into a refreshing sleep.

In addition to the recurring paroxysms, intermittent malarial fever presents enlargement of the spleen, anemia, pigmentation of the leukocytes, but no leukocytosis.

Estivo-Autumnal Fever (remittent. fever, continued fever) is seen chiefly in late summer and autumn in temperate zones and at all seasons in the tropics, where it is often most severe.

The symptoms of this form are very irregular, the hot state of the paroxysm often lasting twenty-four to thirty-six hours or longer, and the Intermissions are very short. In many cases Instead of actual intermissions there are simply remissions. The chill and the sweat may be as severe as in. the above described form, but usually they are slight and of short duration. Often there is slight jaundice, giving bilious remittent fever. Mild delirium develops in some cases causing the condition to resemble typhoid fever. Marked prostration is always present and the spleen is enlarged.

Pernicious Malarial Anemia: is seen in tropical and sub-tropical countries but is rare in temperate regions. The symptoms vary with the local lesions. If the capillaries of the brain and meninges are the seat of the lesion, delirium, aphasia, and rapidly developing coma (comatose type) develop. If the localization is in the digestive tract, vomiting and purging of serous material, cramps, suppression of urine, coldness of the surface, profuse sweating, and fatal collapse (algid type) are the likely symptoms. In some cases, due to sudden and intense hemolysis (disintegration of red blood cells) the paroxysms are accompanied with jaundice, bilious vomiting, and blood in the urine. Bleeding into the subcutaneous tissues and from the mucous membranes may also occur (hemorrhagic type).

Latent Malaria is the term given to a condition in which the supposed malarial parasites are found in the blood, but no symptoms are present.

Masked Malaria is a latent malaria plus symptoms — headache, neuralgia, diarrhea, dysentery — which are not those of malaria.

Hemoglobinuric, or blackwater, fever, seen in Africa, Italy, Central America and our own southern states, is supposed to be a form of malaria.

Malarial Cachexia presents anemia, sallow or muddy complexion, sub-normal temperature, and perhaps occasional slight fever. The spleen is greatly enlarged and there are marked weakness and emaciation. Indigestion, flatulency and constipation are common symptoms, while periodic headache, neuralgia, and blood in the urine are seen in some cases.

This condition is the sequel to medically treated malarial levers and does not develop under hygienic care. It is said to also develop insidiously as a primary condition.

Etiology: Malaria is said to be due to a parasite or to three parasites — plasmodium vivax, plasmodium malariae, and plasmodium falciparum — which are introduced into the body by the bite of certain mosquitos (the Anopheles). The mosquito derives the parasite from man. The question: which had the parasite first, man or the mosquito, has never been answered. We are certain, however, that the mosquitos and parasites are harmless to the healthy individual. Only the enervated and toxemic have malaria.

Prognosis:  In all stages” malarial fever “yields to eliminative and dietetic treatment, leading to the conclusion that by lifting the load from the digestive organs, all the power of the body is transferred to the organs of elimination, permitting full use of latent, natural, immunizing forces to overcome the plasmodial influences. * * * No relapses have been reported on return to fever-infested surroundings.”

Care of the Patient: During the acute stage the malarial patient should be cared for as in any other acute “diseases” — rest, warmth, fasting. Rigid dietary discipline must be enforced after fever subsides. No quinine or other medicines are given. * * * Tranquil and cheerful surroundings with little or no visiting will aid materially in maintaining a quiet nervous system.

 

MALTA FEVER

Definition: Malta, or Mediterranean fever, so named because it is especially prevalent in Malta, but is seen in other tropical and subtropical countries, may almost be called a chronic acute “disease.” It is characterized by periods of fever alternating with periods of normal temperature and may last a year or more.

Symptoms: Fever is the most striking symptom. The temperature usually rises to a maximum of 103 or 104 F., runs an irregular remittent course for from one, to five weeks, then gradually falls to normal for several days then a relapse occurs. This sequence of events is repeated again and again, the duration of the “disease” ranging from eight weeks to a year or more. During the periods of fever there are general depression, profuse sweating, neuralgic pains, especially in the legs, and swelling of the joints. The spleen is always enlarged and, as the “disease” progresses, anemia and debility develop.

Complications: Medical works list bronchitis, peripheral neuritis, orchitis, and arthritis as the most common complications. As medical “treatment is entirely symptomatic” (suppressive), these complications and the two to three per cent mortality are due to the treatment.

Etiology: The rarest “diseases” are the ones of which medical “science” is most certain it knows the causes. They are sure malta fever is due to the micrococcus melitensis, which finds its way into the body by way of the milk of infected goats. As in all other so-called bacterial and parasitic “diseases,” enervation and toxemia must come first.

Prognosis: Good. Under hygienic care all cases should recover.

Care of the Patient: Care should be the same as that given for malaria or for typhoid fever.

 

MEASLES

Definition: Measles is an eruptive biogony characterized by catarrh of the respiratory tract, moderate fever, and a red papular eruption, which appears on the fourth day and is followed by a bran-like desquamation.

Symptoms: Measles begins with a “cold in the head,” accompanied with slight fever and discomfort. These last from three to six days during which time the patient feels wretched. Soon there follow headache, nausea, sometimes vomiting, and chilly feelings. The coryza is intense with cough and redness of the eyes and eye lids. The temperature rises and the skin, especially on the face, feels hot and tingling. The tongue is furred. The mucous lining of the mouth and throat is an intense red. Little blue dots may be seen on the inside of the cheeks.

The eruption develops on about the fourth day, starting, usually, on the forehead, then the face, then over the body generally. The eruption begins as little red spots, which increase greatly in number and are gradually arranged in groups, sometimes in crescentric groups.

The fever begins to fall on the fifth or sixth day, and a fine, bran-like desquamation (scaling) of the skin begins, which lasts from a few days to several weeks.

Black Measles (malignant or hemorrhagic measles), is a failure of the rash to “get out,” accompanied with hemorrhage under the skin. These cases are said to be usually fatal, perhaps largely as a result of the failure of the eliminative effort.

Complications and Sequelae: Under medical care these are chronic coryza, bronchopneumonia, severe inflammations of the mouth, Bright’s “disease,” nose bleed, arthritis, meningitis, paralysis, and brain abscess.  These must all be the results of suppressive treatment, since they never develop under Hygienic care. Hot drinks should be given freely as these help to ‘bring out the rash.’ A sudden chilling sends the blood to the internal organs and may cause congestion of the kidneys”. This is evident, from an orthodox source, that complications are due to suppressing the eliminating effort through the skin — the rash.

Etiology: Medical authors consider measles to be “highly contagious” but add “the contagium has not been isolated.” We consider it to be due to protein poisoning in a toxemic subject and note that epidemics of measles follow upon the heels of feast days.

Measles is a crisis — nature eliminating an excess of toxin. A cold is supposed to be the lightest so-called disease. There are light crises taking place at various locations internally. A hoarseness lasting three hours; coughs lasting for a few hours or a day; a headache; many small crises causing discomforts for an hour or two. After these have passed off, the person will declare for the remainder of the twenty-four hours, that he or she never felt better. What is the explanation? Toxin saturation. An unusual draft on the reserve nerve energy may precipitate measles, scarlet fever, diphtheria, or pneumonia. In epidemics where one malignant type develops there will be nineteen light cases ranging from two or three days in bed to so slight an angitis (slight irritation or inflammation of the throat) that it will be passed unnoticed. In any epidemic of one hundred pronounced cases there will two thousand so-called infections — a ‘fat’ chance for serum or vaccine immunization. A strict, restricted diet or a short fast, with stomach and bowel washes, and a hot bath at bed time, will put any old epidemic hors de combat! What about the cause? The cause is dirt inside and out. The use of antiseptics is not cleanliness — anything offensive to the nose cannot be benignant. The nose will protect if allowed to do so.”

German Measles (Rubella) is described as “having the rash of measles and the throat of scarlet fever.”

Symptoms: It begins with slight fever, headache, pain in the back and limbs and coryza. On the first or second day the rash develops, beginning on the face and spreading, in twenty-four hours, over the whole body. The rash, consisting of little pink raised spots, fades after two or three days. The fever is slight, the rash is diffuse and of a brighter color than ordinary measles.

Prognosis: Rapid and uniform recovery without the development of complications is the rule under Hygienic care.

Care of the Patient: Due to the persistence of the contagion-superstition these cases have to be isolated.

The patient should be kept quiet and in bed. The room should be light and airy and fresh air should circulate in the room at all times. Medical authors say, “great care should be taken to keep him (the patient) from catching cold, for broncho-pneumonia is to be feared as a complication of measles, and tuberculosis as a. sequel.” This fear of “catching cold” from fresh air is more superstition.

The patient should be kept warm and not allowed to chill. Chilling checks elimination and retards recovery. If it is winter time, a hot water bottle, or other means of applying warmth to the body, should be placed at the feet.

No food should be allowed until 24 hours after acute symptoms are gone. All the water desired may be given, but water drinking need not be encouraged or forced on the theory that it flushes toxins out of the body. Anyway, nature has concentrated the toxins in the skin and has adopted unusual methods of elimination. No drugs of any kind and no enemas are to be employed.

A luke warm sponge bath twice a day, for cleanliness, should be given. Antiseptics and alcohol are to be avoided. Do not use oil, on the skin when it begins to scale.

The mouth and throat should be kept clean. Plain warm water, or warm water with lemon juice, or fresh pineapple juice will do for this purpose. Use no antiseptic gargles. Do not try to reduce or control fever.

Convalescence: This is a critical period if the patient has been cared for medically. There is nothing to fear if the patient has been cared for as above directed.

Feeding should begin with orange juice, or grapefruit juice, or fresh pineapple juice, or fresh apple juice. This should be given as much as desired, for the whole of the first day. The second day, breakfast may be oranges or grapefruit or peaches in season. Lunch should be pears or grapes or apples in season. Dinner may be a raw vegetable salad and one cooked non-starchy vegetable. The third day may begin the normal diet, but in reduced amounts. By the end of the first week the patient should be eating normally.

The patient should remain in bed for at least twenty-four hours after all acute symptoms have subsided. Physical activity should be mild at first. Healthful living thereafter will maintain the improved health that has resulted from this house cleaning.

 

MENINGITIS, CEREBROSPINAL

Definition: This condition is also called cerebrospinal fever and spotted fever. It occurs both sporadically and epidemically. It is characterized by inflammation of the brain and spinal cord.

Symptoms: Several forms are recognized as follows:

(1) Common Form — usually begins abruptly with a chill, followed by vomiting, excruciating pain in the head, back and limbs, and fever. Muscular spasms, especially of the neck and back, cause the head to be bent backward and the back to straighten, or, in severe cases the back may be arched and there is inability to completely straighten the leg. The temperature ranges between 101 and 103, though in some cases it remains nearly normal. The pulse is usually fast, but may be slow, breathing may be affected, the abdomen is often retracted and the bowels constipated. There is usually some delirium and in severe cases stupor and coma are seen. Convulsions often occur. Eruptions sometimes, but not always, occur.

(2) Fulminant Form — this form, often called the malignant form, begins suddenly with a chill, followed by vomiting, headache, moderate fever, convulsions a. petechial or purpuric (hemorrhagic) rash, and death within twenty-four to thirty-six hours from collapse.

(3) Abortive Form: This term is applied to those cases that begin abruptly with grave symptoms, but end in recovery in a few days.

(4) Intermittent Form: In these cases there are intermissions or marked remissions in the fever and other symptoms daily or every other day.

(5) Chronic Form: this term is applied to those cases in which the patient is in a stuporous state for months, after the acute symptoms have subsided. They ultimately become extremely emaciated despite the “plenty of good nourishing food” and “tonics’ so freely given.

Complications: These are largely confined to the nervous system though pneumonia, arthritis and suppurative inflammation of the internal or middle ear develop under medical suppression. The nervous complications and aftermaths are defective vision, defective hearing, aphasia, palsies in various parts of the body, imbecility, chronic hydrocephalus and persistent headache from chronic meningitis.

Etiology: The inflammation is of putrescent origin. Protein putrefaction in the digestive tract superadded to toxemia is the cause.

Prognosis: This is a dangerous acute inflammation, not because of any peculiar nature of the inflammation, but because of its location in or near vital centers. The high death rate and frequent complications and sequelae seen in meningitis seem to be due largely to the free use of opium in treatment. Under hygienic care-the prognosis is usually good.

Care of the Patient: Fasting, quiet and warmth are the great needs. Indeed the patient needs to be kept hot. Hot bath (100 to 105) every three hours, of a half hour’s duration be given.Heat to the body should serve even better.

Any paralysis or other troubles that may follow should be cared for by active and passive exercise, sunshine, proper food and rest.

 

MENINGITIS, SPINAL (Leptomeningitis)

Definition: This is inflammation of the spinal pia mater, a membranous covering of the cord. It may be either acute or chronic.

Symptoms: Acute Form: Acute spinal leptomeningitis alone, without involvement of the cerebral membranes, is rare. It usually occurs as a part of cerebrospinal meningitis. Existing alone it occasionally follows “infectious fevers,” injuries, or exposure. In some instances it is tuberculous. The symptoms are the same as those of cerebrospinal meningitis.

Chronic Form: In this condition there is pain in the back, stiffness of the muscles; excessive sensitiveness, morbid sensations, and, rarely, loss of sensation of the limbs; some loss of power and exaggerated reflexes.

Etiology: Same as that of cerebrospinal meningitis.

Prognosis:  The outlook is grave. Recovery sometimes follows, but rarely without partial paralysis. Acute or chronic inflammation of the coverings of the brain and cord “are always grave” and are “particularly dangerous.”

Care of the Patient: These cases should be cared for in the same manner as described for cerebrospinal meningitis.

 

MUMPS

Definition: Mumps (or idiopathic parotitis) is a symptom-complex characterized by swelling of the parotid gland. It consists of a painful, non-suppurative swelling of one or both parotid glands and often of other of the salivary glands.

Symptoms: The swelling is just below and in front of the ear, and lifts the ear a little. The first evidence of the “disease” may be a sharp pain felt upon swallowing something sour, though the trouble may be preceded by a few days of fever and discomfort. For about two days the swelling increases and the submaxillary and sublingual glands may become swollen. For another seven days the patient has a “swell time” and then the fever and swelling begin to decrease. The mouth can scarcely be opened and there is pain on swallowing ‘when the swelling is at its worst.

Complications: Most medical authorities declare that mumps do not endanger life and that all fatalities are due to complications. Heart disease, kidney trouble, arthritis and meningitis, are only a few of a formidable list of complications they describe. These are the complications that develop in all the other acute “diseases” of children and are due to suppressive treatment. “It should always be borne in mind,” “when thinking of complications, that they “too often wait, not upon the original disease, but upon the treatment of it.” The way to avoid complications is to avoid the suppressive and “drastic cure-quick” methods of treatment.

Adults usually have more suffering with mumps than children. In some male patients the disease is said to “go down on them, ” when orchitis (inflammation of the testicle) develops in one or both testicles. This complication is supposed to result in sterility when both testicles are involved. The complication is due to wrong care. The same is true of vaginitis and the enlargement and tenderness of the breasts, which sometimes complicates the trouble in girl patients. Inflammation of the ovaries is a very rare complication.

Etiology: Enervation and toxemia, the latter, perhaps of carbohydrate origin, are back of this affection. It does not develop in healthy individuals.

Prognosis: Recovery in six to ten days is the rule in those who take proper care of themselves. Pronouncedly toxemic cases, or cases that do not take proper care of themselves may run fourteen days or longer.

Care of the Patient: Rest in bed with warmth until the temperature is normal and the swelling is gone will hasten recovery. No food and no drugs should be given. There is nothing to the popular superstition that acids should not be taken during this time and if the child refuses to fast, orange juice or grapefruit juice may be used.

As soon as the swelling has subsided, fruit may be fed three times a day for the first three days, after which a gradual return to a normal diet may be made.

The above care will prevent complications, but if these have developed before this care is instituted, the fast should continue until all complications and pain are gone.

 

PNEUMONIA

Definition: Pneumonia is inflammation of’ the lung tissue. There are two forms.

Broncho-pneumonia presents small scattered spots of inflammation in the lungs. This type is the most common in small babies.

Lobar pneumonia is inflammation of the lobe, and even more extensive areas of the lung. It is the more common form in older children and adults.

Pneumonia does not develop in children who are properly cared for. It is more serious in infants than in children from three to twelve years. The mortality in pneumonia in early childhood is lower than during any other period of life.

Symptoms: Pneumonia begins, usually, apparently suddenly, although it may be preceded by a cold or bronchitis, with a severe chill or chills, lasting fifteen minutes to an hour, followed by a sudden rise in temperature. Intensely sharp pain in the lower front part of the chest or in the region of the arm pit develops in a few hours. Breathing is labored. There is a dry painful cough, with scanty, sometimes, blood streaked, mucus. After the first day the sputum becomes orange-yellow or prune-juice color. There is rapid pulse and heart action.

Complications: The most frequent complications that develop in pneumonia are pleurisy, empyemia, endocarditis, acute arthritis, meningitis, and jaundice. Chronic pneumonia, abscess and gangrene, mental disturbances, including temporary delusional insanity, and tuberculosis often follow as sequelae. These complications and sequelae belong to medically treated cases, not to those cared for hygienically.

Etiology: Intestinal putrescence in the enervated and toxemic is the cause of pneumonia. There does not exist a predeliction of the toxins for the lungs, but pneumonia develops instead of some other biogony because the lungs offer least resistance.

Prognosis:  Both lobar and bronchial pneumonia, invariably respond in the same even and consistent manner to hygienic care. Pneumonia is a sharp illness, but short. Alcoholics and the aged present a higher death rate than other groups.

Care of the Patient: Open the windows and doors or take the patient out-doors. Stop all food but water. Keep the patient warm — keep a hot water bottle at the feet. Let him rest. Do not disturb him. Secure peace and quiet for the patient. Let him alone and let him get well.

No drugs, no serums, and no food are to be given.

When the fever is gone and the lungs are clear, and there is no more cough, give the patient orange juice. Keep him in bed for at least a week. Rest is important. Keep him on orange juice for most of this time, after which give fruit and then gradually work up to the normal diet. Nursing infants may be given light breast feedings, instead of fruit, after the preliminary period on orange juice.

 

RABIES

Definition: “Rabies,”, “is an acute frenzy — a pathological psychology — evolved by a neurotic who suffered most of his life from neurasthenia.” The symptoms are due to hysteria. Victims die, when they do, from fear and malpractice.

Symptoms: The symptomatology and treatment of hydrophobia have changed as the delusion has passed down the centuries. The ancients “cured” their cases by ducking them in the sea. The madstone of grandfather’s day “cured” those who had faith in it. Any frenzy-building suggestion, whether auto- or extra- generated, may be counteracted by any “healer” or “healing agent” — fetich, talisman, the moss on a dead Irishman’s skull, or a baked toad, etc. — in which the deluded have faith that is sufficiently potent.

Pasteur’s hydrophobia delusion is in line with his germ delusion. His anti-rabies serum is damaging, often fatal.

Dog bites, cat bites, rat bites, wolf bites, etc., are to be cared for as any other wound is cared for. Cleanliness and drainage are the essentials.

 

RELAPSING FEVER

Definition: This term is given to a group of symptoms characterized by a definite paroxysm which usually lasts six days and is followed by a remission of about equal length, then by a second paroxysm.

Symptoms: There is apparent sudden development of fever, this sometimes running as high as 104 F. the first day, with intense pains In the back and limbs. Sweats are common. The pulse is rapid, ranging from 110 to 130. Swelling of the spleen may be detected early. There may be delirium. Gastric symptoms and jaundice may also be present.

After three to ten days (usually five or six) of high or in-creasing temperature, it falls by crisis within a few hours to normal or below, with profuse sweating, sometimes diarrhea. Rapid convalescence is followed by a recurrence of all symptoms on the fourteenth day. The second paroxysm is usually shorter than the first; there may be as many as five relapses.

Complications: Pneumonia, nephritis, blood in the urine, rupture of the enlarged spleen, post-febrile paralyses, ophthalmic, and, in pregnant women, abortion, are common under regular care. These do not belong to hygienic care.

Etiology: Though medical men hold a germ responsible for this condition, its other name, famine fever, reveals its true cause. It is induced by underfeeding and overcrowding.

Prognosis: Under hygienic care recovery is rapid and complications do not develop.

Care of the Patient: Fasting is as necessary during the febrile stage of this biogony as during any other. Rest and warmth are equally necessary. The patient should be cared for as directed in the chapter on Hygiene of Dynamic Biogony. When convalescence sets in, feeding and general hygienic care should be the same as that following typhoid fever.

 

RHEUMATIC FEVER

Definition: This condition is also known as articular rheumatism and may be either acute or sub-acute. It is characterized by inflammation of several joints.

Symptoms: The condition may develop gradually, with discomfort and often tonsilitis, though it usually begins suddenly, with pain in one or more joints and fever. The knees, ankles, elbows and wrists are the joints most often inflamed. The affected joints become red, hot, swollen, painful and tender. The temperature’ ranges from 102 to 104 F., with dry mouth, hot, flushed skin, coated tongue, which may be moist or dry, increased force and frequency of the pulse, headache, restlessness, sleeplessness, diminished, often high-colored urine, and profuse acid sweats. The symptoms frequently disappear partially, from one joint as they begin in another, developing in several in rapid succession. The temperature varies with equal rapidity and corresponds with the degree of joint involvement. Anemia is marked and progresses rapidly. Defervescense is gradual and the condition may become sub-acute or chronic. Pain and stiffness of the joints last long after defervescence.

Complications: Pleurisy, endocarditis, pericarditis, and myocarditis are common under medical care, perhaps due to salycilates. In children, chorea may precede, accompany or follow the fever. Delirium, convulsions and coma are seen in rare cases, giving rise to the term cerebral rheumatism. Skin affections, especially purpura and various forms of erythema sometimes seen are in all likelihood due to the drugs used in treatment.

Etiology: Some medical authorities blame damp weather for “attacks” of rheumatism. Others blame them upon dry years or a succession of dry years. The fact is that any long continued weather condition that depresses and enervates may help to produce rheumatism. The real cause is toxemia plus overeating and neglect of hygiene. Overweight children are especially prone to rheumatic fever.

Prognosis: Weger says: “swelling, pain and temperature al-ways subside rapidly and heart complications occur in less than ten per cent of those treated. (Medical treatment presents endocarditis complications in 50 to 60 per cent of cases). In fact, endocarditis was present only in those cases that did not come under care until after the disease had been already well established -for from one to three weeks.

Care of the Patient: Speaking of the care of a case of rheumatic fever Weger says, “in no case in which food was withheld, from the onset did the temperature remain above normal longer than ten days, and recovery was prompt without merging into the sub-acute or chronic stage. Endocardial or myocardial irritations likewise subsided before any marked organic lesion had time to develop and become the major pathology as is so frequently the case in inflammatory rheumatism.”

This should supply the key to the proper care of cases.Patients should not take anything internally except water.” Other than this rest and warmth are the essentials. Chilling is especially prone to increase the patient’s suffering.

The excessive amount of acid sweating necessitates frequent bathing and change of bedclothes. The patient should never be allowed to lie in clothing wet with perspiration.

The bed clothing should be raised so that it will not rest upon the inflamed joints.

After the acute symptoms have subsided the patient may be fed fruit for the first two days and fruits and vegetables thereafter for the first week. No proteins or carbohydrates should be fed during the first week.

ROCKY MOUNTAIN FEVER (Tick Fever)

Definition: This is the name given to a biogony seen in certain valleys of the Rocky Mountains, which closely resembles typhus fever. It is supposed to be “transmitted ‘by the bite of a tick,” but “the nature of the infectious agent is not known.

“Symptoms: The condition develops with a chill, pains in the head, back and limbs, and fever. The fever rises rapidly and may reach 104 F., at the end of a week. In the milder cases it gradually subsides, reaching normal at the beginning of the third week. The pulse is very rapid (120-140), the bowels are constipated, the conjunctiva are injected and in many cases there is marked jaundice. About the third or fourth day a red macular rash develops on the wrists and ankles, and then spreads over the body. In a few days the macules become purpuric — hemorrhagic. In severe cases, general edema and gangrene of the skin in certain parts are seen.

Etiology: Sepsis, probably of gastro-intestinal origin, superadded to enervation and toxemia is indicated by all the symptoms.

Prognosis:  Death occurs most frequently during, the first ten days.

Care of the Patient: Medical “treatment is altogether symptomatic” which accounts for the high death rate. The disease should yield to the ordinary treatment of fasting, bathing, washing the bowels every day, and absolute quiet.

 

SCARLET FEVER (Scarlatina)

Definition: Scarlet fever is a biogony characterized by sore throat and a diffuse scarlet eruption. This “disease” was not considered dangerous until after the invention of a. prophylactic serum, whereupon it immediately became one of the worst scourges of childhood.

Symptoms: The child becomes “suddenly” sick. In most cases there is vomiting and, in children, often a convulsion. The temperature runs up on the first day to 104 or 105. The face is flushed, the skin hot and dry, the tongue heavily coated and the throat is sore. On the second day, often on the first, the rash develops. This appears as tiny red dots on a flushed surface, giving the skin a vivid scarlet color. Beginning on the neck and chest, it spreads rapidly, covering the whole trunk in twenty-four hours. It is not really a “breaking out,” but is an intense congestion (erythema, or blushing) of the skin. The skin is swollen and tense and often there is intense itching. The redness disappears upon pressure and disappears after death, as the blood leaves the skin.

One standard medical ‘author tells us that “after the use of belladonna, quinine, potassium iodide, or diphtheria antitoxin, there is sometimes a rash closely resembling that of scarlet fever. In septicaemia (blood poisoning) there may be a similar rash.” The rash is a means of eliminating the drugs, serums (proteins), and septic matter. A condition so like scarlet fever that authorities can’t agree whether it is or not, frequently follows surgical operations.

The tongue, though coated, is very red on its edges. The taste-buds are swollen, producing the “strawberry” or “raspberry” tongue. In severe cases the throat, always sore, is covered with a membrane which greatly resembles that of severe diphtheria. Other symptoms are those common to all fevers.

The rash begins to fade in two or three days and is completely gone in four days to a week. I have never had a case to last over four days. The skin peels off.

Malignant Scarlet Fever is a more severe form. It begins with more severe symptoms with fever that may reach 1080 F., and all symptoms of severe septic poisoning, including delirium, passing into coma.

Hemorrhagic form: is characterized by small hemorrhages into the skin gradually increasing in size, epistaxis (nosebleed) and blood in the urine.

Angionose form: is characterized by early appearance of severe throat symptoms, with membranous exudate which may extend to the trachea, bronchi, Eustachian tubes and middle ear, and presents the appearance of a severe case of diphtheria.

Complications: Nothing condemns the prevailing medical methods like the frequency with which complications occur in this “disease.” Acute nephritis develops in 10% to 20% of their cases and is regarded as the starting point for many cases of Bright’s “disease” in later life. Arthritis, acute inflammation of the lining and investing membranes, of the heart (endocarditis and pericarditis), otitis media, often resulting in deafness, and other troubles develop so often as a direct result of the suppressive methods employed that it is a crime to permit them to continue.

Etiology: Scarlet fever is an expression of protein poisoning superadded to systemic toxemia. Medical works say it is due to an “unknown germ.”

Prognosis:  Scarlet fever has “invariably responded in the same even and consistent manner.” Again: “In the exanthemata or eruptive fevers, most of which are common in childhood, our routine procedure has given better results than any other treatment we have ever tried. The complications following such a disease as scarlet fever, so frequently observed under ordinary treatment, are sufficiently guarded against by a no-food plan of treatment during the entire active stage.”

Properly handled, these cases will be free of all rash in four days to a week. There will be no fever after the third day and the illness will be so light that parents and friends will say the child was not very sick. It requires feeding and drugging to produce serious illness.

Care of the Patient: These cases should be cared for just as advised for measles and smallpox. Flannel gowns employed by medical men, in scarlet fever, are not to be employed. These things belong to the doctoring habit and are of no earthly value.

 

SLEEPING SICKNESS (Trypanosomiasis)

Definition: This affection, prevalent on the west coast of Africa, is characterized by swelling of the lymph glands, moderate fever, progressive emaciation, increasing lethargy and, finally, death in coma.

Symptoms: The affection is divided into two stages, the first of which lasts from a few months to three or four years. The only symptom of this stage is enlargement of the lymph glands. The second stage usually lasts several months and is characterized by increasing weakness and lethargy, a peculiar apathetic expression, a feeble monotonous voice, tremor of the hands, a rise of temperature (101 to 102 F.), a rapid feeble pulse, lymphocytosis (excess of lymph corpuscles in the blood) and, finally, coma. The temperature is usually subnormal during the last two or three weeks.

Complications: Pneumonia and septic meningitis are frequent complications.

Etiology: The protozoon, gambiense, which is said to gain entrance into the body through the bite of the tse-tse fly, is claimed to cause this “disease.” The evidence points to chronic sepsis of animal food origin in a greatly enervated individual as the basic or primary cause. Hundreds of cases of a somewhat similar character have been reported in Europe and America caused by smallpox vaccination.

Prognosis: It is said that “recovery probably never occurs” and that “treatment is of little avail.” This is no doubt due to the fact that arsenic and an aniline dye, trypanroth, form the chief reliance in treatment.

Care of the Patient: The digestive tract is doubtless the source of the septic material. A fast, followed by proper feeding should clear this up and remove the soil upon which the trypausomes feed. Certainly there is sufficient time in the three or four years these cases often live to make effective changes in their mode of living. The fast should be accompanied by rest and warmth. Thereafter a fruit and vegetable ,sun baths and exercise will complete the work of recovery.

 

SMALLPOX (Variola)

Definition: This is an acute exanthematous affection characterized by an eruption which is successively papular, vesicular, pustular and a crust and by a peculiar febrile course.

Symptoms: The “disease” begins with a chill, or in children, often with a convulsion. This is followed by intense pain in the back and limbs and vomiting. The temperature rises rapidly, to 104 or more, the pulse is rapid and a restless delirium is quite common. A transitory rash, similar to that of measles or scarlet fever, may next appear. On the fourth day the true smallpox rash develops. Bright red spots (macules) appear in the wrist and forehead, and in a few hours on the face, limbs and trunk. They soon become raised and feel like shot in the skin (pepules). When the papules appear the fever abates and the patient feels better. Two or three days after the rash appears the papules develop a cap of clear fluid and thus become vesicles. The fluid becomes yellow as the serum in the viscles becomes pus, forming pustules.

Notice the evolution of this “disease.” Chill, perhaps a convulsion, pains, vomiting, rapid pulse, restless delirium and a high fever, and then large quantities of toxin-laden blood thrown into the skin, causing redness. The toxins are collected into circumscribed lumps, after which the temperature returns to near normal and the other symptoms practically cease.

The pustules are surrounded by a narrow area of inflamed skin. The pustules begin first on the face and cover the body by the eighth day. The fever then rises again — the “secondary fever of suppuration” — and the general symptoms return. The pustules dry down to crusts and these gradually drop off, beginning on the face on the fourteenth or fifteenth day of the “disease.” The “secondary fever” may last twenty-tour hours, but it usually is longer. When it ceases, convalescence begins. The crusts may and may not leave scars, “pits,” when they fall off.

Discreet Smallpox is the term applied to those cases where the eruptions, are more or less scattered.

Confluent Smallpox is the term applied to cases in which the papules are abundant and soon coalesce. In these cases the extremities are swollen and painful and true pocks nearly always develop in the air-passages and give rise to a fetid discharge from the nose and throat, hoarseness, and cough. Delirium, stupor and subsultus (twitching movements) are frequent symptoms.

Purpuric Smallpox (hemorrhagic or back smallpox) presents hemorrhages under the skin and eyes, and bleeding from the mucous membranes of the mouth, nose, lungs, rectum, and from the kidneys. These cases are severe and often die before the papules develop.

Varioloid is a term applied to mild cases of smallpox in which the eruption is scanty and of short duration and secondary fever is absent. It is often said to be seen in those “who have been partially protected by previous vaccination.” However thousands of cases are seen in unvaccinated people while some of the most severe cases of variola are seen in vaccinated and re-vaccinated individuals.

Smallpox is practically unknown in America today. Cases are met with chiefly among Negros, Mexicans and Chinese. There are many conditions, such as ivy poisoning, mosquito bites, chicken pox, amaas, Cuban itch, wisse pocken, etc., that are, frequently diagnosed as smallpox, just as before the time of Sydenham all cases of measles, chickenpox and scarlet fever were diagnosed as smallpox. Today if a case of chickenpox has no vaccination scar it is small-pox; if a case of smallpox has a vaccination scar it is chickenpox. Few cases now reported as smallpox are ever sick enough to go to bed. The mortality from vaccination is much higher than that from smallpox.

Complications: Boils, ulcerative laryngitis, broncho-pneumonia, and inflammation of the eye (conjunctivitis, ulcerative keratitis, iritis) are the most common complications.

Etiology: Smallpox, along with measles, scarlet fever, etc., is commonly referred to in medical works as a “disease of unknown origin.” It is assumed to be due to germs, but the supposed causative germs have never been found. Epidemics occur chiefly in winter when germs are less active. Protein excess, foul air and inactivity seem to be its chief causes.

Prognosis:  As it is palpable to all the world how fatal smallpox proves to many of all ages, so it is clear from all the observations that have been made is , that if no mischief is done, either by physician or nurse, it is the most safe and slight of all diseases.” Under hygienic care recovery is rapid with little or no pitting.

Care of the Patient: The care of a patient with smallpox is simplicity itself. So long as there is fever, nothing but water should be allowed to pass the patient’s mouth. After the temperature is normal, while the eruption is still present, if there is hunger, oranges, or grapefruit or fresh, raw pineapples may be given.

The “disease” is as contagious as in growing toenails, and every case must be quarantined. Fear of the “disease” must be kept up in the public, for it is only thus that the present farce can go on.

Place the patient in a well-lighted, well-ventilated room. Make him comfortable, see that his feet are warm and then let him rest. His body should be sponged twice daily with luke-warm or slightly cool water for cleanliness.

Itching will be slight if proper care is instituted at once. Scratching must be discouraged.

Give the patient all the water to drink that is desired. But there is no good to be derived from forced water drinking.

If the patient sleeps but little do not be disturbed over this.

Cared for as above, few cases will ever pit. The subsequent health will be much better than the prior state.

Convalescence: If the patient is properly cared for during this illness, convalescence will be a joy. There will be no dangers. Under proper care there are no complications and sequelae. There is no danger of a relapse.

The diet should be fruit for breakfast, fruit for noon and a large raw vegetable, salad and a cooked non-starchy vegetable in the evening. After the first week this may be changed to fruit for breakfast, a salad and cooked non-starchy vegetable and a starch at noon, and a salad, two cooked non-starchy vegetables and a protein in the evening.

 

SYPHILIS”

Definition : Syphilis, as’ described by our present day pathologists, is an impossible pathological conglomeration that frenzies both doctor and patient, making of the former a syphilomaniac and of the latter a syphilophobe.” It is “the deity proteus that can assume the appearance of every disease.” It is a nightmare, a myth, a lie. It has been created by years of painstaking effort.Older medical works describe three stages — primary, secondary and tertiary. More recent works describe early and late syphilis. It is now claimed that the first two stages of the earlier syphilographers may not manifest before the appearance of the tertiary stage.

Though it is claimed to be a “specific disease” due to a specific germ, the “remedies” in use are not serums or autogenous vaccines, but drugs that are pronouncedly toxic and known to affect the system detrimentally. These drugs produce more formidable pathologies than the “disease” for the cure of which they are administered. The whole theory of syphilis, its propagation and cure, as described in text-books and medical lecture rooms, is a delusion.

The eighty or more serologic tests that have been developed to detect “syphilis” are admitted to be unreliable. They are tests to reveal the presence of the non-existent. “Syphilis” exists only in imagination.

Of the chance, or primary lesion of “syphilis,” “The real disease is an ulcer, inguinal gland enlargement, a rash over the abdomen, extreme nervousness and anxiousness — not from physical pain but from fear, resulting for the popular opinion of the dreadful character of the disease. The distressing symptoms come later. Time is needed to develop toxic drug symptoms. Legitimate symptoms will pass away in two to six weeks. If the victim is greatly enervated from tobacco, alcohol, venery, and gluttony, it will take two months to get back to the normal. The physical state of the patient is not considered at all by the syphilomanic doctors.”

Care of the Patient: Fasting and a correct mode of living are the only requirements.

TETANUS (Lockjaw)

Definition: A biogony characterized by toxic convulsions—tetany.

Symptoms: The beginning may be marked by a chill or chilly feelings, but usually it is by rigidity of the neck, jaw and face. This gradually increases to a tonic spasm and extends to the muscles of the trunk and extremities. The body becomes rigid in a straight line or bent forward, backward or laterally. Spasm of the glottis may result in asphyxia. The tonic spasm has frequent exacerbations following any slight irritation and is extremely painful. Temperature, though usually low, may rise very high, especially late in the course of the biogony.

Etiology: Septic poisoning from a pent-up wound.

Prognosis: Only a small percentage of these cases recover.

Care of the Patient: The first essential in these cases is to open and thoroughly cleanse the wound. No food but water should be given. The patient should be kept hot — not warm, but hot.

 

TUBERCULOSIS (Consumption)

Definition: An adynamic biogony characterized by gradual wasting of the body and the formation of tubercles — nodules or diffuse masses of tissue.

Symptoms: Tuberculosis may develop in many parts of the body and its symptoms vary with the organs involved. What are called its constitutional symptoms — loss of weight, weakness, afternoon rise in temperature and night sweats — are present in all cases.

 

Pulmonary Tuberculosis (Phthisis) or tuberculosis of the lungs is divided into two chief forms — acute and chronic. The acute form is further subdivided into three other types — acute pneumonic, bronchopneumonic and acute miliary. These distinctions are of no practical importance.

Acute tuberculosis of the lungs closely resembles croupous pneumonia or bronchopneumonia in its early stages. But instead of the symptoms subsiding in ten days to two weeks, they persist and gradually become more or less characteristic. The fever becomes remittent or intermittent, chills and sweats occur, signs of softening and excavation develop in. the affected lung, anemia and emaciation result in from four to eight weeks. In rare cases a certain amount of improvement occurs and the clinical picture slowly changes to that of chronic ulcerative tuberculosis.

Acute General, or Miliary, Tuberculosis: This form is always secondary to a more or less obvious primary tubercular condition somewhere in the body — lungs, lymphatic nodes, joints, etc. It develops gradually and is characterized by loss of appetite, discomfort, headache, increasing prostration and fever. The temperature is very irregular, ranges from 102 to 104 F., and is marked by evening exacerbations and morning remissions. Respiration is rapid and the pulse is feeble and rapid — 140 to 150. Profuse sweating is common; there may and may not be coughing. As the condition develops typhoid symptoms — dry brown tongue, muttering delirium, subsultus tendinum (twitching movements), carphologia (picking at the bed clothes) and stupor frequently develop. Two forms, pulmonary and meningeal, are recognized. In the first there are difficult and rapid breathing (40 to 60 a. minute), hard cough, mucopurulent and bloody expectoration, and cyanosis. In the second form there are intense headache, convulsions, photophobia, delirium, ocular and facial palsies, stupor, coma, and Cheyne Stokes breathing. Miliary tuberculosis is said to be invariably fatal, death coming in three to four weeks.

Chronic Ulcerative Tuberculosis: is said to begin insidiously and is marked by pallor, gastric disturbance, loss of flesh, and strength, and by a dry, hacking cough that is noted especially in the morning. Undue exposure, overeating and other forms of stress often aggravate the cough. In a few cases the symptoms appear abruptly with hemorrhage or as an acute pleurisy. In other cases the first symptom is gradually developing hoarseness.

Slight fever with acceleration of the pulse develops early. There is a rise of temperature in the afternoon or evening. During the day the eyes are bright, the face flushed and the mind animated. As the pathology in the lungs develops the cough becomes troublesome, the expectoration more abundant, of a greenish gray color, heavy, often, blood-streaked and in coin-shaped plugs. Pleuritic pains are often present, hemorrhages from the lungs occur in 50 to 60 per cent of cases and in the late stages bleeding is often profuse, though seldom immediately fatal. There is sometimes vomiting excited by coughing, and breathing is accelerated, though there is rarely dyspnea except on exertion.

The final stage presents extreme emaciation, weakness, pallor, anemia, remittent or intermittent fever of a hectic or septic type, and often edema of the feet. The mind is usually clear and peculiarly hopeful till the last.

Chronic Fibroid Tuberculosis: This form, which may last for several years, is marked by gradual loss of flesh and strength, difficult breathing, mucopurulent expectoration, which is at times fetid from retention in bronchial cavities, night sweats, frequent hemorrhages, and marked clubbing of the fingers.

Tuberculosis of the Kidney: The chief symptoms of tuberculosis of the kidney are pain in the lumbar region, (small of the back) which is usually dull, but sometimes sharp like that of renal colic, tenderness on pressure, frequency of urination, dysuria (painful urination), slight, irregular fever, and more or less cachexia. The urine, usually acid, may contain pus, blood, albumen, and cheesy particles, and debris.

Glandular Tuberculosis (scrofula) is usually localized in the cervical, mediastinal, or mesenteric nodes, most commonly the cervical.

Cervical Scrofula is common in poorly nourished children living in badly ventilated or crowded rooms. Its development is usually preceded by catarrh of the nose and throat and tonsilitis. The submaxillary nodes are usually first to become involved. These are enlarged, smooth, firm and, generally become matted together. Later the skin may become adherent and suppuration occurs, the resulting abscess breaking through the skin and leaving an obstinate, sinus. The posterior cervical axillary, sub-clavicular and bronchial glands may also become involved. Commonly there is also anemia. A protracted course and spontaneous recovery are common, or pulmonary or general miliary tuberculosis may develop.

Mediastinal Scrofula is tuberculosis of the nodes of the trachea and bronchial tubes. Symptoms result by compression of adjacent blood vessels, or there may be pleurisy and pericarditis. A caseous node may rupture into the trachea, bronchial tube or esophagus. The symptoms otherwise are those general to all forms of tuberculosis.

Mesenteric Scrofula is tuberculosis of the mesenteric and retroperitoneal nodes. The enlarged nodes may often be felt in the abdomen. The symptoms are loss of flesh and strength, anemia, abdominal distention and tympanitis with offensive diarrheal stools. Tubercular peritonitis is often present.

Tuberculous Pleurisy may be primary, but is perhaps most commonly the result of the spread of tuberculosis from the lungs or trachobronchial nodes. It may be acute, and become chronic, though most often. it is chronic or subacute from the start.

Tuberculous Pericarditis (tuberculosis of the investing membrane of the heart) presents the same local symptoms as any other form of pericarditis.

Tuberculous Peritonitis is most often seen as an extension of pulmonary or intestinal tuberculosis, or of tuberculosis of the fallopian tubes.

Tuberculosis of the Larynx may be “primary” or secondary to cervical or pulmonary tuberculosis. Huskiness of the voice, loss of voice, loss of weight and strength and anemia are the chief symptoms. There is a viscid, purulent fibrous sputum.

Tuberculosis of the Alimentary canal may exist in any part of the digestive tract, but especially in the intestines. The symptoms are diarrhea or constipation, some abdominal pain, irregular fever and sometimes intestinal hemorrhage.

Tuberculosis of the Brain is usually chronic and involves both the brain and meninges. The symptoms are those of brain tumor.

Tuberculosis of the Bones presents besides the constitutional symptoms common to all forms of tuberculosis, pain in the bones, swelling, and suppuration with discharge of pus, often containing pieces of bone, through one or more sinuses.

There may be tuberculosis of the skin, joints (tubercular arthritis) and other parts of the body.

Complications: Chief among the complications are bleeding from the lungs, bronchopneumonia, pleurisy, pneumothorax, or pneumopyothorax, gastro-intestinal catarrh, rectal fistula, amyloid degeneration of the viscera and tuberculosis of other parts.

Etiology: It is an infectious disease, caused by the tubercle bacillus. The intelligent reader will think this is a strange “disease” the cause of which may be present early, but usually is not, but manages to get in late in most cases, while sometimes it allows the “disease” to wiggle along as well as it may without any aid at all from its cause. What are we to think of the good sense and logical reasoning powers of the members of a supposedly scientific profession who write and teach among themselves that a certain bacillus causes a certain “disease,” but that the “disease” may commence without the cause; that the cause appears late in the “disease” more often than at the beginning, and in some cases does not appear at all? It is equivalent to a causeless effect..

Tuberculosis has a developing stage of several years, beginning with enervation, toxemia, catarrh of the stomach, infection of the glands of the lungs, and finally, tuberculosis. It is the endpoint of an evolutionary process begun with toxemic crises, in those of a tubercular diathesis. As enervation and toxemia are intensified, the gastro-intestinal catarrh and food decomposition become more pronounced, septic infection from this source initiates adenitis; and here is the foundation for tuberculosis — here is the sine qua non for germ development. A subacute lymphangitis or adenitis produced by mercury or arsenic may lead to tuberculosis.

Children may inherit a predisposition to tuberculosis and there is but one prevention; namely, avoid enervation and its consequence, toxemia. Before tuberculosis can develop in those predisposed to it, habits must break down resistance and bring on toxemia; after which glandular degeneration follows, with destruction of life. If the tubercular-diathetic subject never develops toxemia, he will never develop tuberculosis; for so-called “disease” can develop only on a basis of toxemia. The so-called, tubercular germ has about as much influence in a normal individual, or in a gouty subject, as a feather has in a cyclone.

All the tubercular are functionally disordered and have considerable impairment of the liver and stomach. Years of indigestion have not only robbed their tissues of adequate nutrition, but the intestinal poisoning has resulted in chronic adenitis and, finally, tuberculosis. That calcium deficiency is present in all cases is shown by the fact that all tubercular subjects are dental cripples. A large part of them had rickets in childhood. All of them have lived on denatured diets.

Tuberculosis develops out of an enervated, toxemic and putrescence-infected body soil. Wrong food, overcrowding, foul air, lack of sunshine, and all enervating influences are basic causes of the trouble. bacillus is a mere incident in its development and course.

Vaccinations and inoculations are frequently followed immediately by tuberculosis. A shock follows the use of every immunizing agent unless it is inert. In all subjects who are very close to toxin saturation a vaccination or a serum inoculation may, and often does, precipitate a case of tuberculosis.

Prognosis: Acute tuberculosis presents an unfavorable prognosis. Chronic tuberculosis is almost always remediable in the earlier stages, but may reach a hopeless stage in all cases. Recovery almost never occurs under the prevailing medical care.

Prevention: Fresh air, an abundance of sunshine, wholesome outdoor play, plenty of fresh fruits and green vegetables, cleanliness and plenty of rest and sleep will prevent tuberculosis. It is largely an outgrowth of the social injustices and economic inequalities of our hypertrophied commercialism.

Children who develop pulmonary tuberculosis have imperfectly developed chests. Imprudent, or unfit, eating causes children of tubercular “hereditary” to develop very early, enlarged tonsils, adenoids, and cervical glands, for which operations are usually advised.

Children of tubercular parents should be taught the great importance of avoiding the parent’s mistakes. They should be taught not to follow the same style of living, eating, thinking, and care of the body of the parents. They should be taught moderation and correct care and how to avoid enervation.

Even the weakest child is born with a certain amount of resistance and infancy and childhood constitute the golden age in which to counteract the inherited weaknesses and build a larger resistance. The forces of development will add to the inherited resistance if the habits of life are right; if habits are wrong resistance will decrease. Too often there is no attempt to cultivate good habits: rather the children are trained in all the bad habits and perversities of the parents.

Care of the Patient: The cure for tuberculosis is prevention. Few ever completely recover. When nutrition has become so impaired that tuberculosis develops, the iron grip with which habits hold such patients and the paralyzing fear possessed by most tuberculosis sufferers, prevents the establishment of full resistance and a return of the organism to normal.

Fresh air is necessary for the tubercular.

Low temperature in the open air does not injure the lungs, as experience has shown but, as in all things else, there is a limit to this matter. There is a difference in the resisting power of healthy and “diseased” lungs. The tubercular subject is enervated and possesses no nerve energy to waste in resisting extreme cold. When the temperature is so low, the body must use up all its extra energy keeping warm and has none left for digestion and elimination..

Harm results to “diseased” lungs when kept from one-third to one-half the twenty-four hours in very cold — zero and below — temperature, when living the remainder of the time in artificially heated houses. Too cold air, if inhaled by those with ulcerated throat or ulcerated lungs, proves to be very irritating and harmful. Because of the irritation, indigestion, and inhibited elimination, pneumonia, bronchitis, or tonsilitis, quincy or a cold may develop. This causes the victim to fly to the other extreme and avoid fresh air and keep himself too warm.

The cold not only irritates the lungs, but it increases the desire for food, while robbing the body of the energy required to digest it. Indigestion thus produces added infection. An abundant supply of fresh air is important at all times, but fresh air need not necessarily be cold.

Medical men, believing tuberculosis to be due to germs, recommend eating for the purpose of keeping up the strength and at the same time to furnish germs with enough food to prevent them attacking the tissues of the body. Plenty of “good” acid-forming foods are forced into these patients to decompose and add to the infection, further decrease the body’s lime supplies, produce diarrhea, increase blood pressure and the liability to hemorrhage.

Fasting is beneficial in all these cases, but long fasts are almost never advisable. Instead of the usual diet of meat, eggs, milk, bread and cakes, the diet should consist largely of fruits and vegetables. Tubercular patients should stay away from milk, butter and cream.

Rest is very necessary, but resting becomes rusting when the patient is required to spend months or years in bed on a stuffing regimen. Rest in bed is essential. Forced rest, for the lungs to the point of surgical collapsing of the chest wall is one of the idiocies of present day “scientific medicine.”

As essential as rest is exercise. Tubercular patients will make speedier and more satisfactory recoveries if they are given exercise within their capacity to take it.

Sunbathing is also very beneficial in all forms of tuberculosis and should be taken in moderation. The tendency everywhere is to overdo this measure, just as the feeding and resting are overdone.

 

TULAREMIA

Definition: This “disease” is said to be primarily a “disease” of wild rodents, especially rabbits, but is “transmissible” to man by dressing infected animals or by the bite of ticks and flies. It is a very rare condition, therefore the germ causing it is well known. Were it a common affection; such as a cold or measles, the germ would still be unknown.

Symptoms: Weakness and loss of weight are prominent symptoms. In about one per cent of cases in man subcutaneous nodules or a skin eruption develop.

Complications: Pneumonia is a frequent complication in the second week of illness.

Etiology: It is probably due to absorption of putrescense from decayed meat. The bacterium tularence is merely adventitious.

Prognosis: Under medical abuse the death rate is only about 5.3%. This should indicate that, properly cared for, all cases will recover. Convalescence is slow, due to the same abuse.

Care of the Patient: Fasting so long as acute symptoms persist, and thereafter a fruit and vegetable diet and general health measures are the requirements.

 

TYPHOID FEVER

Definition: This is an acute biogony involving largely the small intestine. The bacillus typhosus is accused by the medical profession of responsibility for this condition. It is our contention that the germ responsible for typhoid fever is named Medical doctors. It requires typical textbook treatment to produce a typical case of typhoid fever. The typhoid state” is a state of profound exhaustion, depression, prostration, a term applied to prostration in any “fever.”

Symptoms: The “disease” is preceded by a few days or weeks of headache, backache, nosebleed, perhaps, and a period of not feeling very well. There is usually constipation and a coated tongue. The breath is foul and there is often a bad taste in the mouth. For days or weeks the patient is sick and gives no attention to his condition, except, perhaps to drug it. After a period as described above, the temperature begins to rise and the patient becomes so weak and miserable that he goes to bed. The fever rises slowly and in from three to seven days reaches 104 to 106. Here it usually remains, under the stuffing and drugging plan, for a week or more, before it begins to fall. It falls and rises for another week or more and finally reaches normal. Under medical care these cases last from two weeks to a few months. The strong man presents a slow, “soft” pulse and the pulse rate is of ten very slow during convalescence. During the first few days of the fever, the headache is very severe, even, at times, terrible. On the seventh or eight day, red spots develop on the abdomen. The abdomen is tender and distended with gas. Gas pressure on the heart often overstimulates this organ.

Complications: Perforation is the most dreaded complication of typhoid fever, and the cause of death in almost a third of the fatal cases. When the slough peels off, the ulcers usually have a very thin base, sometimes as thin as tissue paper, but in about 5 per cent of the cases even this gives way and the intestinal contents pour into the abdominal cavity, at once producing peritonitis. In the very few cases that do recover there is in the abdomen an abscess. A perforation occurs especially during the third week, although it may occur at any time (as we reckon the days), and since due to almost the same cause as hemorrhage, occurs very often with this.

In mismanaged cases there is swelling and enlargement of the clumps of lymphoid tissue (tonsils) in the intestine, called Peyer’s patches, followed by ulceration and sloughing of these. Hemorrhage from the intestine sometimes follows this sloughing, although the body usually succeeds in sealing the blood vessels before sloughing occurs.

If no feeding has been done there will be no septic material in the intestine to pour into the abdominal cavity and cause peritonitis.

In severe cases “secondary disease” develops in the kidneys or lungs, or spleen, or cerebro-spinal centers. Complications and relapses are quite frequent under medical malpractice. The regular treatment of this disease is an unpunished crime. After a week or two of heroic treatment plus plenty of milk, eggs, broth and starchy foods, malaria takes on typhoid complications, typho-malaria; pneumonia becomes typhoid-pneumonia; “bilious” cases become typhoid. Some of them will die of hemorrhage of the bowels. The food put into such patients can only rot and develop sepsis. Sepsis, plus the chronic irritation produced by drastic cathartics and other drugs, is enough to produce ulceration and sloughing. The feeding and treatment are quite enough to account for all unfavorable symptoms. Such treatment simply does not allow them to get well. It is scientific murder.

The food taken into the stomach at such a time decomposes, the rotting processes that take place in the bowels cause septic poisoning, and every complication named in the best works on the practice of medicine is produced by this septic condition. If patients are allowed no food at all, no sepsis will occur; hence there can be no complications; in fact, the prospective fever is jugulated and in reality never develops. All diseases threatening to take on a typhoid condition, even typhoid fever itself, will be thus expunged from the nomenclature: for they will never have an existence, if treated properly.”

Paratyphoid Fever is the name given to a group of cases that clinically and pathologically resemble typhoid fever. Paratyphoid A and paratyphoid B are terms used. The terms came into use to save the face of the anti-typhoid serum.

Etiology:  Imprudent eating by enervated and toxemic subjects starts the chain of symptoms, which, when wrongly managed, culminate in typhoid fever. There will be germs, of course, and the more food is taken the more germs there will be.

Prognosis:  The fever can be controlled to run its course in from eleven to thirteen days instead of the usual three weeks. No complications, temperature never rising above 101 F. after the second day following the withdrawal of food. Headache, tympanitis, and other symptoms usually so distressing, become negligible, and recuperation is steady and uneventful.

Care of the Patient: The care of the typhoid patient should now be apparent to the student.

Rest in bed in a well lighted, well ventilated room, with all unnecessary noise and distraction kept away from the patient, and a daily warm sponge bath for cleanliness are essential. If it is winter a hot water bottle should be kept at the patient’s feet.

Absolutely no food except water should pass the patient’s lips until several days after all acute symptoms are gone.

No drugs of any kind should be employed. No purging; no “sustaining” the heart, no controlling the fever, and no checking of the bowels should be allowed. Hydrotherapy also should be avoided.

Let the patient alone and he will get well. Feed him and drug him and he may and may not pull through. In the first instance he will be comfortable in three days and out of bed in from seven days to fourteen days. In the second instance he will not be comfortable at any time and will do well to get out of bed in several weeks.

When such patients are fasted the stools and urine are germ-free by the time convalescence begins. The more they are fed the more decomposition and sepsis will develop, the higher the fever will run, the more tympanitis, greater suffering and more danger. “A properly treated typhoid fever case can never be a carrier.” A return to good digestion and normal resistance means the body refuses hostage to germs and parasites.

As previously pointed out, hemorrhage will not develop, in properly managed cases; that is, unless fed and medicated. Should the case be mismanaged until hemorrhage occurs, the foot of the bed should be elevated and absolute rest and quiet secured. No one should be allowed to speak to the patient and no mad-cap endeavors to restore or “sustain” the patient should be resorted to.

 

TYPHUS FEVER

Definition:  In the middle west there are continued, malarial, typho-malarial, and typhoid fever. In all probability these are different forms of typhoid fever. Typhoid means at least like typhus. The treatment is the same in either case. A patient may pass into what is called a typhoid or sinking state, from almost any other disease that is of much consequence.”

Symptoms: The symptoms and pathology are those of severe typhoid fever plus the eruption which appears first on the abdomen and upper part of the chest on the third to fifth day, then on the extremities and face. It is complete in two or three days.

Complications: Bronchopneumonia, gangrene of the lungs, extremities, nose or mouth, or pleurisy, meningitis, parotitis, nephritis and septic processes in the subcutaneous tissues and joints, are due to sepsis generated in the intestine.

Etiology: Completely broken resistance in one who has abused his constitution; then he becomes feverish from intestinal sepsis; feeding and drugging do the rest. Typhus is not basically different from any other badly treated continued fever. Typical cases can develop only under medical care.

Prognosis: Children fare better than adults. Under medical abuse the mortality ranges from 12 to 20 per cent.

Care of the Patient: Same as for typhoid fever.

 

VACCINIA

Definition: Stevens Manual of the Practice of Medicine defines vaccinia as “a general disease with a local manifestation resembling the pock of variola, and acquired by inoculation with the virus of cow-pox.” In medical works it is listed under “acute infectious diseases.”

Symptoms: Vaccinia begins after vaccination with slight irritation at the sight of inoculation. On the third or fourth day the eruption, appears in the form of a red papule, surrounded by a red areola. On the fifth or sixth day the papule becomes a vesicle, being filled with a watery or clear substance, with a distinct central depression (umbilication). By the eighth day the vesicle is perfected and is then surrounded by a wide reddened zone of inflammatory edema, which is the seat of intense itching. By the tenth day the contents are purulent (pus) and the vesicle has become a pustule. The surrounding skin is now much inflamed and painful. About this time the reddened areola begins to fade and dessication sets in with the gradual formation of a thick brown crust or scab which becomes detached and falls off about the twenty-first to twenty-fifth day, leaving an ugly scar. The scar is at first red but gradually becomes paler than the surrounding skin; having a punched-out appearance and is pitted. The evolution of this pathology is accompanied with fever and constitutional symptoms, discomfort, and enlargement of the adjacent lymph nodes.

Complications and Sequelae: Irregular and atypical pocks may form; several vesicles may coalesce, a general pustular rash covering the whole arm or a large part, of the body, and called generalized vaccinia, may develop about the eighth to tenth day, abscess, sloughing, cellulitis, erysipelas, general septic infection, urticarial eruptions, “syphilis,” leprosy, tuberculosis, actinomycosis (big jaw), mental “disease,” tetanus (lockjaw), paralysis, meningitis, sleeping sickness, etc., may follow. In rare cases the pock may reappear in the same place after it is apparently healed. In some instances the abscess may refuse to heal. Sir William Osler says: “In children the disease may prove fatal.”

In his Principles and Practice of Medicine, Osler quotes the following arrangement by Ackland of the days on which possible eruptions and complications may be looked for:

“1. During the first three days: Erythema; urticaria; vesicular and bullous eruptions; invaccinated erysipelas.

“2. After the third day and until the pock reaches maturity: Urticaria; linchen urticatus; erythema multiformae, accidental erysipelas.

“3. About the end of the first week: Generalized vaccinia; impetigo; vaccinal ulceration; glandular abscess; septic infections; gangrene.

“4. After involution of the pock: Invaccinated diseases, for example syphilis.”

Under the heading “Transmission of Disease by Vaccination, Osler says, “syphilis has undoubtedly been transmitted ‘by vaccination.” Under the heading, “Influence of Vaccination upon other Disease,” he says: “A quiescent malady may be lighted into activity by vaccination. This happens with congenital syphilis, occasionally with tuberculosis. * * * At the height of the vaccination convulsions may occur and be followed by hemiplegia” (paralysis of one side of the body.) Within recent years it has been definitely proven by the friends of this superstitious practice that vaccination causes sleeping sickness (encephalitis lethargica or encephalomyelitis) and poliomyelitis (infantile paralysis).

Etiology: Vaccination is the criminal inoculation of an individual with septic matter (pus) derived from suppurating (festering) sores on the abdomen of a previously infected cow.

Prognosis: Most cases recover. Death occurs in a few cases.

Care of the Patient: Vaccinia is best avoided. It is a useless, superstitious rite. The claim that it prevents smallpox is wholly false. Where vaccination is compulsory the vaccine should be thoroughly washed off as soon as it is applied to the arm. If done immediately this will prevent infection. If not done and infection has already taken place, cleanliness and general hygienic care of the body are all that are required. Complications should be cared for as advised under their headings elsewhere in this volume.

 

VALLEY FEVER

Definition: The medical profession is engaged in mystery mongering. It frequently discovers a new and mysterious “disease” such as parrot fever (psittacosis) and valley fever (cocciciodomycosis).

We are informed that “precise knowledge regarding the ailment is still lacking, but it is believed to be caused by spores of certain types of fungus that attack the lungs, lymph nodes, skin and bones.”

In its “early stages, valley fever often is mistaken for severe colds, influenza or bronchial pneumonia. ‘In the absence of a cure for the ailment, its victims receive the same treatment as prescribed for tuberculosis,” which accounts for the high death rate, sometimes as high as fifty per cent, reported.

Add this new “disease” to syphilis, influenza, rabies, chronic appendicitis, etc., as another myth.

 

VINCENT’S ANGINA

Definition: A biogony closely resembling diphtheria and doubtless thousands of such cases are contained in the diphtheria statistics of all periods.

Symptoms: There is inflammation of the mouth and uvula, less frequently of the mouth and pharynx, or lips, with the formation of a false membrane. In severe cases there is ulceration, extending into the submucosa. The breath is peculiarly fetid, the neighboring lymph glands are enlarged, but the constitutional symptoms are, as a rule, comparatively mild. The average duration is from one to three weeks.

Etiology: The condition represents a mild septic infection derived from gastro-intestinal sepsis.

Prognosis: Weger says Vincent’s angina “has invariably responded in the same even and consistent manner.

“Care of the Patient: Care for Vincent’s angina as for a cold.

 

WHOOPING COUGH (Pertussis)

Definition: A. symptom complex characterized by a paroxysmal cough followed by a long inspiration, or “whoop.”

This trouble is described in medical works as an acute bronchitis. We do not recognize it as a catarrhal affection at all. We regard it as a nervous affection having its origin in “disease” of the cerebrum or the spine.

Symptoms: The symptom-complex derives its name from the long drawn inspiration with a “whoop” which follows a paroxysm of coughing. In ordinary coughing one inhales after each cough. In this condition the patient attempts the impossible task of coughing from fifteen to twenty times during one expiration. Then he draws in the air with a long-drawn inspiration, accompanied with a whoop. But little mucus is expelled and the whole action is evidently nervous.

The trouble begins with a dry, harassing cough with no apparent excuse for existing. For there is no irritation of the throat or lungs. For about two weeks this spasmodic coughing continues when the characteristic whoop develops. The cough comes in paroxysms and is sometimes so hard that vomiting results. The whooping usually lasts about two weeks, then another two weeks are required for the trouble to decline and end.

During the paroxysms the veins swell, the face becomes blue, the eyes bulge out, their whites are “blood-shot,” and the child looks as though it must suffocate.

Swallowing, emotions, or even throat irritations may induce a paroxysm. Hearty eating is almost certain to result in a series of paroxysms. The child (it is usually a child) may have but a few or a hundred paroxysms a day. Children who are otherwise in good physical condition appear to be as well as ever when the paroxysm ends.

Complications: The lungs are injured in rare cases by the severe paroxysms of coughing. Sometimes they become emphysematous (distention of the lung tissue with air), sometimes they literally burst. Bronchopneumonia is a frequently fatal complication known only to medical practice.

Hemorrhages into the skin, conjunctivae, or into the brain, epistaxis, hemoptysis (spitting of blood) and tuberculosis are seen in badly treated cases.

Etiology: Putrescent poisoning superadded to enervation and metabolic toxemia.

Prognosis: Weger says: “Whooping cough seldom runs longer than three weeks (under hygienic management) and presents none of the usual alarming symptoms.”

The only danger in this condition is the rupture of a blood vessel. The violent paroxysms place a severe strain on the heart and blood vessels. Rupture into the eyes, ears, nose, lungs, brain or skin may occur. The hemorrhage into the brain may result in paralysis or even sudden death. Bleeding from the nose and ears, and occasionally from the lungs, occurs in a few cases.

A child that sinks exhausted, becomes fretful and nervous and seemingly fearful of the paroxysm, and presents red spots on the forehead and in the white portion of the eyes is suffering with conges

tion of the brain and is in danger.

Care of the Patient: As harassing as this condition usually is and as notoriously unsatisfactory as the paregoric, freely given, protective vaccines, “large quantities of good nourishing food” and “change of climate” of medical methods, the condition can be made tolerable by giving the children proper care.

Tilden says: “If it starts in children who already have deranged digestion, and they are then fed, not allowing them to miss a meal, complications are liable to occur, such as tremendous engorgement of the brain during the paroxysms. The blood-vessels will stand out like whip-cords on the forehead, and when the child is over the paroxysm it is completely exhausted. Unless such a case is fasted, the cough grows more severe, the stomach derangement increases, causing more and heavier coughing, until there is danger of bringing on a brain complication.

How different this is to the wail of the medical man that: “Some children vomit at the end of a paroxysm, and so often during the day that they almost starve.”

Weger says: “children do not need to fast in this disease except during the inflammatory or congestive crises with rise in temperature. Such crises are not likely to occur unless the patient is fed in a manner to produce gastric hyperacidity and colonic stasis.”

The “disease” is of the nerve centers, the cough being a “reflex cough,” and the nervous system of the child must be looked after. He should be put to bed at once and the feet kept warm. He should be given all the fresh air possible and as much water as thirst calls for, but no food of any kind until complete relaxation is secured. Children that are outdoors all day suffer less than those in the house. Whenever possible the bed should be outdoors. Otherwise, put the child by the open window. The rest and warmth will quiet the nervous system. It is questionable whether the whooping stage will ever develop if this “treatment” is instituted at the beginning of the trouble. Complete relaxation should occur in three or four days.

The commonly unrecognized evils of mental over-stimulation of children is usually very evident in troubles of this nature. This should be particularly avoided. Complete relaxation and rest of the nervous system is very important in this condition.

After full relaxation is had, fruit juices may be given morning, noon, and night for two or three days, after which fresh fruit may be used. If the cough tends to increase after feeding, stop the feeding at once. “It is usually observed,” says Page, “that the cough grows worse toward evening, and is worst at night. By morning there has bean something of a rest of the stomach, and the cough is easier — perhaps disappears entirely. A full meal is often the exciting cause of a fresh and violent paroxysm. Other things equal, the child who is oftenest and most excessively fed will suffer most and have the longest ‘run’.” After the paroxysms have ceased gradually return to a normal diet.

Convalescence: Medical men tell us this is tedious. This is their experience. We don’t weaken and kill our patients. They tell us that the child must not be allowed to “catch cold,” or overdo. A change of climate and “large quantities of good nourishing food” (meaning by this, meat, eggs, pasteurized milk, puddings, white bread, etc.) are recommended for the chronic cough that so frequently follows in medically treated cases.

We recommend an abundance of fresh fruits and green vegetables, sunshine, fresh air, exercise and rest and sleep. These are the elements out of which health is compounded.

 

YAWS

Definition: A condition seen in the tropics and almost wholly confined to members of the African races.

Symptoms: It is characterized by numerous and successive yellowish tumors on the skin. These gradually increase from mere specks to the size of a raspberry, one becoming larger than the rest. The slight fever which is less noticeable in adults than in children is thought to be merely irritative. Some medical authorities consider yaws to be a form of “syphilis.”

Care of the Patient: Same as for Leprosy.

 

YELLOW FEVER

Definition: A severe biogony characterized by jaundice, hemorrhages and albuminuria. Dr. Shew said “yellow fever is only typhus of a severe form complicated with jaundice.”

Symptoms: There may be slight early discomfort, but the beginning of symptoms is usually abrupt, with chilly feelings, headache, backache, rise of temperature and general febrile symptoms, vomiting and constipation. Early in this development the face becomes flushed with congestion and slight jaundice of the conjunctiva of the eyes. The temperature usually is 102 to 103 F. and falls gradually after one to three days. The pulse is slow and falls while the temperature rises. Simple albuminuria or severe nephritis may be present. When the temperature falls there follows a stage of calm, followed by a rise of temperature, with increased jaundice and vomiting of dark altered blood — “black vomit.” Hemorrhages into the skin or mucous membranes may occur. Mental symptoms are sometimes severe. The severity of yellow fever varies from “great mildness” to “extreme malignancy.” Convalescence is usually gradual.

Complications: Abscesses and parotitis are the chief complications.

Etiology: Medical works say, “The specific organism of yellow fever has not yet been isolated.” They also say “man is inoculated through bites of certain species of mosquitos * * * The mosquito is infected only by biting a yellow-fever patient during the first three days of the disease.” This leaves unexplained which was first infected — man or mosquito.

We consider yellow fever to be another result of septic infection. Sepsis is the only infecting agent in all infections.

Prognosis: Under medical care the mortality varies from 15 to 85 per cent. I can find no records of cases cared for by hygienists.

Care of the Patient: This is one condition where many medical authorities recommend fasting, at least during the first day or two. This is not long enough. No food should be given until all acute symptoms have subsided. The care should be the same as that given for typhoid fever. Medical works say, “remedies have little effect upon the black vomit.” Under proper care from the beginning, there should be little or none of this. Trall says: “The black vomit, so alarming to friends and physicians, does not always take place, and when it does happen, I believe it is owing more to mal-medication than to all other causes combined.”