Neurosyphilis : $b Modern systematic diagnosis and treatment presented in one hundred and thirty-seven case historiesSouthard, Elmer Ernest
Science
Neurosyphilis : $b Modern systematic diagnosis and treatment presented in one hundred and thirty-seven case histories
Southard, Elmer Ernest
Neurosyphilis
1. In view of the fact that this _Landwehr_ man appears to have
acquired syphilis while on campaign, what is the responsibility of
the government for treatment? The Canadian authorities, as stated
under Case E, are in doubt whether contraction of venereal disease
constitutes negligence on the part of the soldier. It would appear
to us that where a government does not take suitable steps to
prevent the acquisition of syphilis by the soldiers, the
government must assume a measure of responsibility for the
syphilis incurred. The government’s responsibility would be still
greater in equity, it would appear, if commercial opportunities
for the acquisition of syphilis are maintained under more or less
close government supervision or (even as has been claimed for
certain encampments on our own Mexican border) if shelter for
illicit sex relations is afforded within the limits of a military
camp. In a certain community, “E,” for example, it is claimed by
Exner,[29] the district for prostitutes was “situated within the
lines of military camps and protected and ‘regulated’ by the
military authorities.”
But even if the government has no legal responsibility in this
regard, it would be well to consider the ultimate results of the
syphilis that will probably be acquired by great numbers of
soldiers under campaign conditions. Aside from the ravages of
syphilis outside the nervous system, it is well known, as Weygandt
intimates for German conditions, that the aftermath of war will be
a high proportion of cases of neurosyphilis.
Weygandt remarks in his review of the influence of the war upon
psychiatry, that the opportunity for syphilitic infection in the
campaign is considerable. In the war of 1870, the conditions in
this regard were extremely unfavorable, and writing in 1915,
Weygandt remarks that at present there should be a prophylaxis
against syphilitic infection by the soldiers, which prophylaxis
should be the most energetic possible. Continence on the part of
the soldiers and the isolation of infected women, with examination
by specialists, have been advocated by Neisser and by Mendel. In
the ’80’s a great number of cases of locomotor ataxia developed in
Germany, which were due to syphilis acquired by the soldiers and
officers in the war of 1870.
=Syphilis in a psychopathic subject. Convulsions 5 days after
Dixmude. Case from Bonhoeffer, 1915.=
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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