Offices and Laboratories of the State Health Department are located on the Ohio State University Campus. The offices are in Page Hall; the Laboratories are in the Hygienic Laboratories' Building. TABLE OF CONTENTS EDITORIALS - Crowder Gives Facts on Draft Rejections - Tuberculosis Hospitals as a War Measure — Scarlet Fever Danger to Children from 2 to 10- Embalmers Must Register Renewals of Licenses - The "Why of Smallpox." A Graphic Illustration - Failure to Vaccinate Another Frequent Cause - An Object Lesson in Public Health Needs - New Epidemiologist Takes Up Duties - Sew Another Star on Service Flag - Higher Milk Prices Hurt Babies' Health Health Officer Ought to Health Indications in Data on Draft Rejections.. Scorecard System in Public Health Work, by James A. Tobey, Scientific As- sistant, U. S. Public Health Service... Chillicothe Installs More Rigid Code of Sanitary Regulations. Looking After Ohio Soldiers Discharged for Tuberculosis.. Census Bureau Issues Weekly Death Figures..... All States Asked to Work Together to Control Venereal Diseases.. Army Seeking Nurses to Increase Corps by a Thousand Percent.. Relative Values of Public Health Procedures, by Charles V. Chaplin, M. D.. Superintendent of Health; Providence, R. I. (Abstract from The Department to Lend Water Chlorinator in Emergency Cases. General Vaccination - Can't "Farm Out" Hospital - Fight School Vac- cination Order- Assumes Office in Xenia-Difficulties of Quarantine -Health Council's Program - New Whooping Cough Procedure — To Save the Baby - Old Health Fallacies - New Health Head in Dayton 46 The Ohio Public Health Journal VOL. IX JANUARY, 1918 No. 1 Crowder Gives Facts EDITORIALS Exponents of the "them-was-the-happy-days" school of thought have been busy for some months, deploring what they said was the physical degeneration of the modern youth as demonstrated by the alleged large percentage of draft rejections because of bodily unfitness. They have been accustomed to wind up their laments with the declaration that there was nothing of the kind back in the good old days of the Civil War draft. "We never heard of anybody being turned down for physical reasons then," was the published remark of one of these Jeremiahs not long ago. Now comes Provost Marshal General Crowder, director of all the draft machinery, and upsets all this reminiscent discussion with the aid of a few cold figures, contained in his report to the Secretary of War. Of the 2,510,706 men examined on the first call, according to General Crowder, 730,756, or 29.11 per cent, were rejected on physical grounds. In the Civil War, he adds, the draft authorities rejected 31.69 per cent of the men summoned. In view of the advance in standards of medical diagnosis since the Civil War, declares General Crowder, the figures indicate a decided improvement in the physical condition of the young men of the nation. All of which is most encouraging to public health workers of the country. It has seemed almost incredible, when one considered the present wide scope of governmental work in the interest of public health, as compared with the almost absolute lack of such activity in the '60's, and when one considered the great advances of recent years in medical science, that the physical condition of the young man of today should not be at least as good as then. With direct evidence lacking, however, the health worker has had to remain silent and wonder whether, if all these years of effort had resulted only in a loss of ground, it would ever be possible for the forces of right living to gain the upper hand. Now, however, the evidence is at hand, presented by the most unimpeachable authority, and it shows a marked improvement in fifty years in the health of the nation's youth. This presentation of the situation should spur on to increased effort every person engaged in the work of promoting the nation's health. Not content with the gain which has been made, every one in the health army ought to resolve that the next equal improvement shall be achieved in less than a half century. And as one surveys the present scope of work, he can hardly doubt that this will be accomplished. We are building from the ground up in child hygiene, we are educating the people to care for their bodies, we are providing nurses for the indigent and ignorant sick, we are making living conditions sanitary in both city and country, we are steadily lessening the danger of epidemic diseases, we have physicians who prevent as well as cure disease, and just now we are at last awakening to the need and possibility of stamping out the ages-old venereal disease curse. May the critics of 1970 also be proved wrong when they say the nation's health is poorer than a half century before! Tuberculosis Hospitals An important opportunity for getting accuas a War Measure rate information as to the prevalence of tuberculosis among a large element of the population, and for following up many individual cases, is presented by the system of co-operation between the tuberculosis division of the State Department of Health and the military medical examiners. The permanent value of the information, however, is lessened by the fact that in more than half of the state facilities for the care of the tuberculous are lacking. To take advantage of its present opportunity, therefore, and also to prepare for the abnormal tuberculosis increase which can be expected to follow the return of our soldiers from the front, the State Department of Health is making special efforts to bring before the counties of the state the desirability of immediate action for the establishment of district tuberculosis hospitals. Any two to ten counties are permitted by law to combine for the erection of a tuberculosis hospital. By this arrangement, efficient care for the tuberculous can be provided in a manner much more economical than if each county had to build and conduct its own hospital. Every county commissioner owes it to his county to investigate thoroughly the possibilities of the district hospital, if his county is not already a member of an established district. Every commissioner ought to push along to the best of his ability the campaign for equipment. which will make his county an effective fighting unit in the war against tuberculosis now become a phase of the great war for democracy. Any information or advice desired by county officials or by individuals interested in laying this matter before their county officials will willingly be furnished, upon application, by the State Department of Health. Outlines of just how to go about founding a hospital and concise statements of the exact tuberculosis situation in every county are available. Scarlet Fever Danger to Children From 2 to 10 Emphasis laid in an article in last month's Ohio Public Health Journal upon the dangers of whooping cough and measles to child life should not have the "reverse English" effect of causing the importance of scarlet fever to be underestimated. As shown by figures which accompanied the article mentioned, scarlet fever, during the five-year period 1911-15, caused fewer deaths than did either of the three other important childhood epidemics. Nevertheless, a death total of 1,666 in five years is by no means a small one. Furthermore, analysis of the four totals shows that for one period of life scarlet fever stands not fourth but second. From the child's second birthday anniversary to his tenth, scarlet fever is a far more threatening disease than either measles or whooping cough. The death totals of these three diseases and of diphtheria for this period of life are: Diphtheria Scarlet fever Whooping cough 2.811 1,073 618 475 At ages under two, there is no comparison between the enormous death toll of measles and whooping cough and the small one of scarlet fever. After the tenth birthday, however, scarlet fever continues to be surpassed only by diphtheria, until the twentieth birthday, when measles overtakes it. The figures for this period, while not quite so pertinent to a discussion of childhood diseases as those above, are here given, for the same five-year period: The latter part of winter and the early part of spring bring most of the scarlet fever deaths. The rate falls to its lowest point in late |