The annual loss from pneumonia aggregates 135,000 lives, a large portion of which is due to weakened bodily resistance resulting from these degenerative affections.
Cancer, a baffling disease to which our people in their present physical condition are highly susceptible, claims 75,000 lives annually and is increasing very fast. Deaths from external cancer alone have increased 52 per cent. in ten years.
Pellagra, a deadly plague new to this country, is increasing rapidly in some of our Southern States, and it excites but slight public concern.
Over 150,000 Americans are destroyed annually by tuberculosis. We know how to prevent it, but our taxpayers object to the expense and leave the battle almost wholly to charity.
Nearly a million afflicted people are spreading the poison of tuberculosis to the well, with virtually no official restraint or supervision because of the expense.
Over 25,000 Americans are still sacrificed annually to the preventable filth disease—typhoid fever. About 300,000 suffer from it and are more or less impaired by it.
Other germ diseases are wasting more lives than typhoid and tuberculosis combined. We are warring against them, but compared to the lives still being lost our efforts are feeble and only partially effective.
Over 90,000 Americans are killed annually by accidents and various forms of violence. Our efforts to prevent the steady increase of this waste have failed.
The annual economic loss due to preventable disease and death is conservatively estimated at $1,500,000,000, and our life loss at about $250,000,000.
To prevent fire waste our cities spend through the public service approximately $1.65 per capita, and to prevent life waste, 33 cents per capita.