The Health bulletin [serial] - University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

252 THE HEALTH BULLETIN.game is up. Out in Seattle the Sun, alusty infant of Far Western journalism,performed a like service for itscity; and some years ago the ClevelandPress made a valiant but onlypartly successful effort in that vicinity.But the Chicago campaign has been byfar the broadest and most significant.On its letterhead the Tribune termsitself "The World's Greatest Newspaper."To our mind its antiquack victorygoes far toward making the boastgood. Collier's Weekly.RESPONSIBILITYWho Is Accessory to the PatentMedicine Fakery ?Says one of the quarry of the Tribune'squack hunt: "I have paid mostof what I made to newspapers thatprinted my ads." Despite its source,that statement is indubitably true.Without newspaper advertising noquack can hope to do business. TheTribune, in its articles, showed that assoon as the advertising was cut off thevenereal sharks ceased to receive patientsenough to keep their oflBces going.Consider, you newspaper reader,It meansthe true significance of this.that the responsibility for quackery inyour town rests with your daily paper.If the newspaper owner didn't acceptthat poisoned and reeking money thequack couldn't continue to take hisprofit of human terror and human misery.And the responsibility of thenewspaper is readily brought home.No use in attacking the quack exceptby process of law, and most state lawsalong this line are wretchedly flimsy.Moral suasion cannot influence thecrooked practitioner because he has nocharacter. But a newspaper has acharacter, and that character is part ofits capital. Where the emoluments ofevil advertising bring open disgraceupon a journal that journal will dropthe advertising. It took the Tribunebut four days to clean up every newspaperin Chicago. In Portland the paperswere compelled by force of publicopinion, voiced through a committeeof citizens, to discard this class ofbusiness; and now there are no venerealquacks in Portland. What citywill be next in line? The task is possibleto any community which can organizepublic opinion. The methodis simple and direct. Compel the newspapers,by force of fear or by the persuasionsof decency, to cleanse theircolumns, and quackery will promptlyand surely die of inanition. Collier'sWeekly.NO HELP YET FOR FAT PEOPLERead This Before You Spend Moneyfor Obesity CuresSince the beginning of time thosefortunate, or unfortunate, persons whohave had too much to eat and too littleto do have endeavored to escapefrom the bondage of fat by some meanswhich would reduce them to normalproportions, but leave them free toovereat and be lazy. Probably antifatremedies were advertised to the Romanpatricians 2,000 years ago. Theyhave been ever since, and they alwayswill be so long as there are men andwomen who eat more than they needand work less than they ought to. Asthese individuals generally belong tothe leisure class, with plenty of moneyto spend on self-improvement, they forma tempting group for the confidenceman and the fake medical swindler.Antifat remedies and reducing treatmentshave been sprung on the publicby the score. Most of them have beenpromptly exposed as frauds or havedied a natural death as soon as a reasonablenumber of victims found thatthey did not fulfill the extravagantpromises made by their promoters.The public has recently been treated