TABLE NO. 127. Otitis media as a complication with the following diseases, enlisted men in United States, 1917.

TABLE NO. 128.-Complications of fatal cases of appendicitis, enlisted men in United States, 1917.

TABLE NO. 129.-Complications of fatal cases of otitis media, enlisted men in United

TABLE NO. 130.-Complications of fatal cases of diphtheria, enlisted men in United

States, 1917.

TABLE NO. 130A.-Complications of fatal cases of German measles, enlisted men in

United States, 1917.

TABLE 131.-Case mortality rate from selected diseases, United States enlisted men and native troops, in other countries, 1917 (including Mexico, Philippines, Hawaii, Panama, Porto Rico, China, at sea).

1 Number of cases calculated by subtracting from gross number of admissions the remaining 1917 cases and the readmissions 1917.

TABLE NO. 132.—Case mortality rate from selected diseascs, enlisted men in Europe, 1917.

1 Number of cases calculated by subtracting from gross number of admissions the remaining 1917 case and the readmissions 1917.

TABLE NO. 133.-Case mortality rate from selected diseases among officers, total, 1917.:

1 Number of cases calculated by subtracting from gross number of admissions the remaining 1917 cases and the readmissions 1917.

TABLE NO. 134.—Case mortality rates from selected diseases, United States enlisted men.

1 Number of cases calculated by subtracting from gross number of admissions the remaining 1917 cases and the readmissions, 1917.

IX. THE FRUITS OF PREVENTIVE MEDICINE.

The crowding together in barracks of raw recruits many of whom come from sparsely settled areas is a procedure that is always fraught with great danger, a danger greater even than that of actual battle. Thus, it was stated by Virchow, in 1879, that in the Crimean War the French Army lost 96,615 men by death; only 10,240 fell before the enemy; about an equal number of wounded died in hospitals; and more than 75,000 men died of disease. In the American Civil War, 97,000 men died in battle and 184,000 from epidemics and sicknesses. Microorganisms are an enemy more to be dreaded in war than armed forces.

To understand the nature of the dangers that accompany the mobilization of an army it may be instructive to compare the annual number of deaths from various causes and the percentage that each is of the total deaths among males, 20 to 30 years of age, in civil life (1915) and in the Army enlisted men of the United States, white and colored (1917). Such a comparison is made in Table 135.

TABLE NO. 135.--Causes of sickness in Army and civil life compared.

NOTE.-The terms used in naming causes of death in civil life are as given in United States Census Mortality Statistics, 1915, Table 7 A. The corresponding terms used for the Army data are indicated by numbers (in parentheses) which are those used in the "Coding Book for Diseases and Traumatisms," Medical Department, United States Army, 1917.

Table 135 shows the relative frequency of the various causes of death in civil life and in the Army. It seeks to answer such questions as this: Was measles (in 1917) a relatively commoner cause of death in the Army than in civil life? Is suicide a relatively commoner cause of death in the Army than in civil life?

To make a comparison between the Army and civil life, it has to be kept in mind that the Army consists chiefly of males between the ages of 21 to 30, inclusive. The census returns for mortality (of the registration area), 1915, give the number of deaths for each disease for all males, 20 to 29 years. There were 30,929 such deaths, or, on the average, 3,093 for each age year. This is to be compared with the 3,611 deaths occurring in the Army, 1917. To make the comparison more precise there is also given the percentage that each cause of death is of total deaths in civil life and in the Army, respectively.