Henry Baird Favill, AB, MD, LL.D., 1860-1916, a ... - University Library

MEDICINE AND PUBLIC HEALTH 219
that it is desirable to outline has been realized, there still
remains the third problem, how to bring to bear upon the
masses of people in the world the knowledge and facilities
available for their succor in their dire conditions. How
to generalize, for the benefit of the race, specific knowledge,
how to distribute to the many the special advantages formerly
available only to the few, is a problem in sociology,
and that means not only a task which can not be solved by
physicians as such, but which can be participated in by
them only in so far as they make themselves sociologists.
According to our present light, the technique of management
in any given case of tuberculosis is reasonably well
settled so far as the method of election is concerned, but
what may be determined as the minimum in point of facilities,
cost, and attention, maintaining at the same time
efficiency, is as 3^et more or less open to question. The
present conception of a perfect regime, whether prophylactic
or curative, in spite of its simplicity of principle, is
exceedingly complex in its broader relations as to practicability.
It is perfectly obvious, however, that the success of any
movement, considered from the community standpoint, is
going to be limited by considerations of feasibility. Not
only must the social conditions in which the community
reposes be molded, adapted, and perfected, but the determination
as to the essentials of management of this subject
must proceed to the fullest possible extent in the direction
of simplification.
The problem of combating tuberculosis in communities
presenting comparatively small groups of indigent families
is really simple. It requires nothing more than a determined,
intelligent effort on the part of the forces working
to that end. The sparseness of population, the accessibility
of open spaces, the comparative cheapness of supplies, and
the lack of enormous
'
' group inertia ' ' pertaining
to masses
of people, all offer features of feasibility and ease of