Mr. Tawney. Were there any other changes made in your system to which any part of this could be attributed?
Dr. Fronczak. Yes; the new tunnel. With the construction of the tunnel we found a difference, and the fly exterminator contributed some. But the use of chlorine gas is the best investment Buffalo has made for the reduction of death rate that I know of.
Capt. Norton. We started using water from the new intake in January, 1912, but it was not used entirely. There was some water used from the old intake. For 1912, 1913, and 1914 the death rate was 13½ per 100,000, and for the 10 years previous to the opening of the new intake it was 24½. So that we had a reduction prior to the introduction of chlorine gas of 12 per 100,000, and last year it was 10, and this year it is below that.
Mr. Tawney. You can not attribute the favorable result entirely to the use of chlorine gas?
Capt. Norton. Two things. The other is getting into the best thread of the current, which was done on the advice of Mr. George Fuller, and that worked out well; and one of the points I tried to bring out before your commission—that where you had the thread of the current, which was apparently pure, compared with the remainder of the stream, perhaps the average condition over the whole thread of the current would impose somewhat of a hardship on the city of Buffalo in the way of reduction of 90 per cent which you propose here, which seems to me too high.
Dr. Fronczak. I would like to place some figures before the commission as to the death rate in Buffalo, as follows:
| Total number of deaths for 1915 | 6,853 |
| Total number of cases of typhoid fever for 1915 | 259 |
| Total number of deaths from typhoid fever in 1915 | 46 |
| Total number of deaths January to May, inclusive, 1916 | [1]3,374 |
| Total number of typhoid cases to June 20 | 61 |
| Total number of deaths January to May, inclusive | 16 |
[1] Does not include stillbirths.
Mr. Seelbach. I refer you to a journal published by the Society of Economic Industry, of London, England, dated June, 1915, a lecture given by J. Grossman on the disposal of sewage sludge. The article is very long, and I will quote the following:
It is to be hoped that draining this enormous waste of material which should go back to the land, and which represents a value of at least £2,000,000 per annum in this country, will not continue indefinitely, and that it will be recognized that sewage sludge is a national asset which should be dealt with by the Government in the interest of agriculture, to which a cheap and inefficient manure will be of incalculable benefit.