1893-1894 - The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

144 XOKTH CAEOLIXA BOARD OF HEALTH.
In conclusion, a word as to the disinfectants to be used. Those recommended
in the Instructions for Quarantine and Disinfection, a copy of
which has been mailed to every registered physician in the State, except
those in three counties whose addresses could not be obtained, were
given after verj- careful consideration and due consultation of the best
authorities. It is advised that they only be used, as they are reliable,
cheap and convenient. Beware of ready-made, patent or proprietary
disinfectants; they cannot be depended upon as germ killers, though
they may be very good deodorants.
SANITARY PROGRESS IN 1893.
With this issue of the Bulletin the edition will be increased fi-om eight
to twelve hundi'ed copies, and it will
hereafter be sent to every member
of the State Medical Society as well as to every other person interested
enough in it to ask for it. It is to be regretted that at present the means
at the disposal of the Board of Health do not permit its being sent to
every physician in the State. Althougli it is well known that there are
many excellent men who have never, for various and doubtless good
reasons, connected themselves with that organization, the fact that a
physician is a member of the State Society is presumptive evidence that
he is wide awake and interested in his profession.
No one who realh*
keeps aljreast with medical progress can be indifferent to the claims of
preventive medicine, which has made such rapid strides in late years.
The Board of Health realizes that the success of the cause they have in
charge depends upon the interested support of the medical profession.
Without that supi)ort its most earnest efforts must prove for the most
part fruitless. It is in the hope of exciting a more active interest on the
part of the, generally speaking, representative medical men throughout
the State that this step is taken. The strange indifference, amounting in
some cases almost to actual hostility, to the claims of sanitation shown
unfortunately by many of our physicians—men from whom better things
might Ije expected—is the most discouraging obstacle we have to face.
There is not in the health laws of the State a single claim made upon its
medical citizens which a decent regard for humanity not only justifies
but demands—as a careful perusal of the same will, we think, prove to
any reasonable man. It is therefore hoped and believed that by bringing
these matters frequently to their attention through the monthly
visits of the Bulletin greater interest in the cause in general and a more
loyal support of the law in particular will be excited among our leading
physicians.
This being accomplished, it is not unreasonable to anticipate
that the influence of their example will gi-adually but surely bring about
a similar state of affairs among their professional associates and the people
at large. While all that has been written is only too true, we have,