November 1,

CORRESPONDE1STCE.

1877.]

SANITATION IN CALCUTTA. proceeding, and it will not be Dr. rapid progress be not made. Payne's This is evident from a perusal of the Health Officer's Report on the public health in Calcutta during the third quarter of 1877. Guess-work has given place to trustworthy labour, and a system of simply collecting and adding up figures to one in which this work is combined with strict and careful local investigation. Sanitation in Calcutta is

fault if considerable and

We

told,

are

we

believe for the first time, that

town

returned

as

tery,

diarrhoea,

or

cholera, or

have

cholera

proved

"

to be

twelve cases,

fever, dysen-

contracted outside the town;

while two persons, whose death had been attributed to fever and dysentery, were found to have died from choleraand Dr.

Payne

writes that "the establishment of

inspector

an

in

Department, in each section of the town, has to obtain a report on every case, based on minute

the Halalcore enabled

me

inquiry

made at the house where the death occurred."

We

look upon Cyanosis epidemics as things of the past, may and although cholera is too real a foe to be banished likewise, now

yet, by constantly beating up his quarters and keeping the eyes of

intelligence department more strictly on him, we may some weak points in his coat of mail. The de-watering of filthy tanks has been vigorously carried " that the necessity for out, and it is satisfactory to know tanks as speedily as possible, with due the rid of regard getting to the tenants' wants, has come to be appreciated by proprietors." Not only the tanks, but the private wells also, are now condemned. Dr. Payne informs U3 that in May he submi tted to the Chemical Examiner the water of twelve wells, and the result was that they were pronounced " suspicious," " unsafe." Again in August, after the rain water had percolated into them through filthy soil, the water of the same twelve wells was our

hope

to find

submitted for analysis, and upon thi3 occasion they to be saturated with poisonous matter. From the wells Dr.

Payne

believes that the

of cholera, which occurred

occurrence

throughout

were use

of isolated

the town,

can

found

of such be

cases

fully

explained. Dr. Payne's organisation powers are well known, and certainly he seems to have not only most efficiently introduced the Halalcore system into Calcutta, but also out of this system organised a thorough Sanitary Department. We hope his efforts will be well sustained by the Commissioners, and his suggestions fully carried out. As the report is interesting, and the method of organising a Sanitary Department for a large town well worthy of imitation, we elsewhere reproduce an extract of Dr. Payne's report.

299

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