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Communications in reference to Advertisements or Subscriptions (Subscription Price $2.00 per annum) should be addressed, Business Manager, BROOKLYN MEDICAL JOURNAL, 214 Madison Street, Brooklyn, N. Y.

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All other Communications, Articles for Publication, Books for Review, and Exchanges hould be addressed BROOKLYN MEDICAL JOURNAL, 356 Bridge Street, Brooklyn, N. Y.

EDITORIAL.

NEW YORK PHYSICIAN'S MUTUAL AID ASSOCIATION.

The Annual Report of the Board of Trustees of this Association, for the year just closed, contains abundant evidence that the merits of its work are gradually being understood and appreciated, in New York City at least, by the members of the profession. The membership has, during the past year, increased from 505 to 715, a net gain of 41 per cent. We regret, however, to notice that the increase of Brooklyn members has been very small. While the Medical Register contains the names of 715 regular physicians practising in this city, but 119 of these are members of the Association. Why our local representation is so small is inexplicable. It must, we think, be due to apathy; certainly it can not be from ignorance of the purposes and value of the organization, for as is well known by all, and fittingly acknowledged by President Lewis, our esteemed townsman, Dr. Reese, has systematically and faithfully presented these claims through a long series of years.

In no better way can physicians provide for the families of their professional brethren who may die posseessed of but little of this world's goods, than by joining this Society; and at no more opportune time does this help come, than just when the head of the family is taken away.

An additional incentive for joining this Association, is that which has for its object the rendering of assistance to one's own family in times of want or affliction. The report before us shows that as a simple life insurance, no man over thirty years of age can secure the same amount as is paid by the Association for the same money. Three cents a day will insure one's life for $650. This rate is less than that of the Mutual Life Insurance Company or the American Legion of Honor, one of the largest assessment Orders in the country. In looking

over the amounts paid to the families of deceased members during the past year, there is not an instance in which anyone had paid one-half the sum received by his family at his death. In one case, but $8 had been paid, still the family received $550; in another case, only $37 had been paid, while $500 were received.

Whether the motive be to provide for one's family or for that of some unfortunate brother-physician, the result should be the same, to cause every one of the profession to make early application for admission to membership in The Physicians' Mutual Aid Association.

THE EPIDEMIC OF INFLUENZA.

During the latter part of October, 1889, an epidemic of influenza declared itself in the City of St. Petersburg. The weather at that time was unusually warm, moist and foggy, and the prevailing wind was west. During the first three weeks it is estimated by a reliable medical journal of that city that from one-third to one-half of the population was attacked, or, in other words, from 396,000 to 594,oco persons. The disease spread with equal intensity among all classes. In the schools the absentees among pupils and teachers amounted to from 25 to 50 per cent. Factories were closed, hospitals overcrowded, physicians and apothecaries overworked. Neither sex was spared, although some physicians thought that there was a disproportionately larger number of males attacked. Children were not exempt, the number of inmates of the children's hospitals being doubled. The question of contagion is still sub judice. The period of incubation was determined to be two days. The attack began with weariness, headache, and chills, followed by pain in the limbs, and fever; the temperature rising to 104° F. Three forms of the disease were observed:

1. The purely nervous form. 2. The form characterized by catarrhal affection of the respiratory mucous membrane. 3. The gastric form, with catarrhal affection of the digestive tract. In the latter part of November the disease was reported from other Russian cities, Moscow, Wilna and Kasan. Such is a brief statement of "La Grippe" as it has been observed in Russia.

In a letter to a New York medical journal, a physician of that city reports a case of influenza which occurred in his practice on December 5th, and which he believes to be one of the early cases in the epidemic which now prevails in the United States. In Boston the beginning of the epidemic seems to have been about December 17th, while so far as we can learn it was not until about Christmas that it claimed any considerable number of victims in Brooklyn. From that time to the present the physicians and druggists of the city have been employed all

day and much of the night in attending to the wants of their clients, the number of visits to influenza patients being for some physicians thirty a day for several days. This extraordinary call for medical services has been very marked in the dispensaries of the city as well as in private practice. In the clinic of one attending physician forty patients applied for treatment during one afternoon. It would be idle to

attempt to estimate the number of persons who have had the disease in Brooklyn, but it must be in the tens of thousands.

Unfortunately, the anticipations of physicians have not been realized as to the mildness of the disease and its freedom from complications and dangerous sequelæ. Pneumonia, especially, has been more. prominent than usual among the factors of mortality. During the week ending January 11, 1890, the deaths were 624, an increase of 153 as compared with the preceding week, and representing an annual death-rate of more than 38 per 1,000 of the population! A death-rate rarely exceeded in the heat of summer when cholera infantum prevails.

What has been said of Brooklyn is equally true of all the cities and towns of the United States. Indeed, so far as we have heard, no community, however small, has escaped. The epidemic is of too recent a date for any comprehensive account of it to be written. It is, however, to be hoped that the medical societies of the civilized world will collect the necessary data for their respective districts, and that from these a scientific history of the epidemic may be written. The Kings County Medical Association has already discussed the subject, and the Medical Society of the County of Kings will take the subject up at its February meeting.

*DOCTORS AND THE LOCAL PRESS.

One of our local dailies, having caused its reporters to interview the physicians of Brooklyn and obtain their opinions on the present epidemic of "grippe," says, editorially, that "it is apparent that, though doctors may disagree as to the presence of the malady commonly termed the 'grip,' there is raging in an almost epidemic form some ailment which leaves its traces on weak lungs, and whets the scythe of the dread reaper. It would surely be of great public benefit if the doctors, instead of wrangling over the presence or absence of a specific trouble, should recognize the fact that sickness is more general than usual, and apply themselves to find a remedy to check it." That is to say, having requested physicians to express their opinions, proving that all were not agreed as to the cause of the epidemic, these differences are denominated "wranglings," and the physicians who gratuitously devoted each a half-hour to the enterprising reporter are denonnced, and advised that they could be better employed in seeking for a remedy.

MEDICAL SOCIETY OF THE COUNTY OF KINGS.

A regular monthly meeting of the Medical Society of the County of Kings was held in the Society rooms, 356 Bridge Street, on Tuesday evening, December 17, 1889, at 8 o'clock.

There were about 75 members present. Dr. A. Ross Matheson in

the chair.

The minutes of the previous meeting were read and approved. The Council reported favorably upon the following applicants for membership:

Drs. Wm. R. A. Carley, Arthur E. Burns, Geo. F. Lloyd, Henry Bullwinkle, Jesse T. Duryea, Gilman Osgood, William Stewart, Robert Schmeltzer, Wm. Neuss, Walter M. Friend, Purdy Sturges, Henry R. Price, Wm. A. Fries, John E. Sheppard, S. S. Brown, Walter Spencer Fleming.

The following applicants for membership, having been favorably reported upon by Council, were declared elected:

Drs. Jno. E. Walsh, Benj. M. Bolton, J. C. Fitzsimmons, George B. O'Sullivan, Lawrence Coffin, Wm. J. Turner, Robert H. Duncan. The following were proposed for membership:

Drs. Wm. Moser, 158 Ross Street, Coll. P. and S., N. Y., 1888; proposed by Dr. James L. Kortright; Dr. David Myerle.

Florence A. Belknap, 131 DeKalb Avenue, Ann Arbor, 1886; proposed by Dr. O. A. Gordon; Dr. Walter B. Chase.

A. W. Waterman,, N. Y. Univ. Med. Coll., 1886; proposed by Dr. Wales Carey; Dr. John Sheppard.

James M. Sayles, 315 Fifteenth Street, L. I. C. H., 1884; proposed by Dr. H. Beeckman Delatour; W. M. Hutchinson.

Charles J. Peterman, Hull and Rockaway Avenue, L. I. C. H., 1883; proposed by Wales L. Carey, M. D.; Dr. John Sheppard.

Geo. D. Barney, 101 Hancock Street, L. I. C. H., 1887; proposed by Dr. Charles Jewett; Dr. Robt L. Dickinson.

SCIENTIFIC BUSINESS.

The Committee on Obstetrics presented their report in three papers as follows:

"Source of Puerperal Wound Infection," by Charles Jewett, M. D. "Note on Immediate Repair of the Cervix after Labor," by Robert L Dickinson, M. D.

"Separation of the Symphysis Pubis, with a case," by George McNaughton, M.D.

Dr. J. G. Johnson then read a paper, entitled "Disease Germs and Disinfectants," which was discussed by Dr. Joshua M. Van Cott, Jr.

UNFINISHED BUSINESS.

The Secretary stated that the amendment creating the position of counsel and attorney-at-law to the Society, presented at the last meeting, had, at the suggestion of the gentleman who was proposed for the position, been abandoned.

NEW BUSINESS.

The Secretary announced that the following amendment to Chapter VII. of the By-Laws would be acted upon at the January meeting of the Society:

Amend Chapter VII. by adding a new section :

"Chapter VII., Sec. 7.-Before entering upon the discharge of his duties, the Treasurer shall give a bond to the Society in the sum of dollars, with one or more sureties, to be approved by the President and one of the members of the Board of Trustees, for the faithful performance of his duties as such Treasurer."

Acting under the direction of the Council, Dr. Chase announced that the following amendment would be acted upon at the January meeting:

Amend Chapter XI. of the By-Laws by adding a new section, viz.: "Chap. XI., Sec. 7.-The reinstatement of members shall be determined by the Council in conformity with Chap. XIII., Sec. 7." Amend Chap. XIII., Sec. 7, to read:

"Chap. XIII., Sec. 7.-Any member who shall continue 'in arrears with the Treasurer' for one year, after having twice received due notice of the existence of this By-Law and of the amount due from him, shall be no longer considered a member; and the member shall not be reinstated except by a two-thirds vote of those present at a regular meeting of the Council and upon such conditions as the Council shall prescribe."

Dr. Chase stated that this amendment had been suggested as the Council had deemed it advisable that such matters should be conducted with as little publicity as posssble.

After some discussion, on motion of Dr. Johnson, duly seconded and carried, it was

Resolved, That in the sense of this Society it is desirable that a steam plant for the disinfection of woolens, similar to the plant suggested by the Health Department's bacteriologists of New York City, be adopted by the authorities of the City of Brooklyn."

Resolved, "That the Secretary be instructed to notify the Mayor and city officers of the adoption of this resolution."

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