(*) But it is when the general figures are taken that we see the
extraordinary reduction that has taken place. Out of every 1000 engaged
in 1908 only a third of the number died that died in 1906, and half the
number that died in 1907.
(*) Figures for recent years supplied by editors.
In 1914, the death rate from disease among white males had fallen to
3.13 per thousand. The rate among the 2674 American women and children
connected with the Commission was only 9.72 per thousand. But by far the
most gratifying reduction is among the blacks, among whom the rate from
disease had fallen to the surprisingly low figure in 1912 of 8.77 per
thousand; in 1906 it was 47 per thousand. A remarkable result is that
in 1908 the combined tropical diseases--malaria, dysentery and
beri-beri--killed fewer than the two great killing diseases of the
temperate zone, pneumonia and tuberculosis--127 in one group and 137
in the other. The whole story is expressed in two words, EFFECTIVE
ORGANIZATION, and the special value of this experiment in sanitation is
that it has been made, and made successfully, in one of the great plague
spots of the world.
Month by month a little, gray-covered pamphlet was published by Colonel
Gorgas, a "Report of the Department of Sanitation of the Isthmian Canal
Commission.
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