Climate and Health in Hot Countries and the Outlines of Tropical Climatology: A Popular Treatise on Personal Hygiene in the Hotter Parts of the World, and on the Climates That Will Be Met Within Them.Giles, George Michael James
Science
Climate and Health in Hot Countries and the Outlines of Tropical Climatology: A Popular Treatise on Personal Hygiene in the Hotter Parts of the World, and on the Climates That Will Be Met Within Them.
Giles, George Michael James
Hygiene -- Popular works; Medical climatology; Tropical medicine
Hill diarrhœa is a peculiar form of chronic looseness of the bowels that
is not uncommon in the Himalayas, and, I believe, in other elevated
regions. Certain people appear specially liable to it, much in the same
way as some are subject to hay fever, while others are never affected;
and the proclivity is so marked in some persons that it is impossible
for them to reside in such localities, and they are hence debarred from
taking refuge from the fierce heat of the plains. We are not very clear
as to its causation, though the disease is traceable in some places to
the presence of finely divided mineral matter (mica) in the drinking
water, and so may be guarded against by careful filtration of all water
used for drinking or cooking. The climate of the hills, again, though
pleasant enough, is during the rains even more treacherous than that of
the plains--damp cold, alternating with warmth; but withal, as has
already been remarked, the disease is mainly one of personal proclivity,
and where the tendency is very marked the only course is to avoid
residing in places where it is apt to occur. Should you, when travelling
in the hills, be attacked with this malady, careful filtration of water
and care in diet should be attended to, and a pill or tabloid containing
one grain each of euonymin, blue pill and ipecacuanha may be taken at
night; but should the trouble persist, no time should be lost in
returning, if possible, to within range of competent medical assistance,
as if neglected, the disease is apt to develop into a most troublesome
condition known as sprue.
_Infantile Diarrhœa_ is terribly common in hot countries, and hence the
least disturbance of this sort should never be neglected in young
children. The rapid rise in the infantile death-rate that coincides with
any approach to a tropical temperature in Europe, shows well how full of
risk is a child’s tenure of life in latitudes where such temperatures
are not the exception, but the rule. The liquid food, which alone is
suitable to the infantile digestion, is perilously liable to
decomposition when the temperature of the air rises much over 70° F.,
and, under such conditions, food which, to the nose and eye, shows no
appreciable change, may yet be virulent with a poison as lethal in its
effects as arsenic, and far more deadly, weight for weight. As a matter
of fact, the poisons which may be generated in food subjected to high
atmospheric temperatures, differ only from the most active of mineral
poisons in their greater virulence, and to commence treatment in such
cases with any agent that checks the action of the bowels ensures an
unfortunate result with even greater certainty than if we were dealing
with antimony or vitriol.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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