AN
ACCOUNT OF SPORADIC CASES
OF
YELLOW FEVER.
AS THEY
APPEARED IN PHILADELPHIA,
IN 1801.
The month of January was intensely cold. In February it became more moderate. The diseases, during these two months, were catarrhs and a few pleurisies.
In March and April there fell an unusual quantity of rain. The hay harvest began in the neighbourhood of Philadelphia on the 28th of May. A few mild cases of scarlatina anginosa occurred during these months.
In June the weather was dry and healthy.
On the 8th of July, a case of yellow fever occurred in the practice of Dr. Stewart. About the 15th of the month, a patient died with it in the Pennsylvania hospital. Dr. Physick informed me that he had, at the same time, two patients under his care with that disease. Several cases of the measles appeared in the south end of the city during this month. In every part of it, the weather was warm and dry, in consequence of which there were no second crops of grass, and a smaller quantity than usual of summer fruits and vegetables. The winds were less steady than they had been for seven years. They blew, every two or three days, from nearly every point of the compass.
On the 4th of August there fell a considerable quantity of rain, which was succeeded by cool and pleasant weather. The cholera morbus was a frequent disease among both adults and children in the city, and the dysentery in several of the adjoining counties of the state.
A number of emigrant families arrived this month from Ireland and Wales, who brought with them the ship fever. They were carefully attended, at the lazaretto and the city hospital, in airy rooms, by which means they did not propagate the disease. Contrary to its usual character, it partook of the remissions of the bilious fever, probably from the influence of the season upon it.
In September there were a few extremely warm days. In the beginning and middle of the month a number of mild remittents occurred, and about the 22d there were five or six cases of yellow fever in Eighth-street, between Chesnut and Walnut-streets, in two houses ill ventilated, and exposed to a good deal of exhalation. I attended most of these cases in consultation with Dr. Gallaher. One of the persons who was affected with this fever puked black matter while I sat by his bed-side, a few hours before he died.