State inspection of food.
The supervision of the national government does not extend, however, to articles of food which are produced, distributed, and sold within the territory of a single state. As regards such articles, the task of protecting the public against impurity and adulteration rests with the state and local health officers. These officers perform their work by frequent inspection at places where food is produced and sold. Makers and vendors of impure or adulterated foods are prosecuted in the ordinary courts.
The Drug Evil.—The indiscriminate and unchecked sale of narcotic drugs (morphine, opium, etc.) in past years led to serious evils. Persons who regularly use any of these narcotic drugs become slaves to the habit; they are unable to get along without daily use of them, and in the end become physical wrecks. The drug habit became, a few years ago, such a widespread public evil that the national government took the manufacture and sale of these narcotics under its own supervision. Such drugs cannot now be bought or sold except under strict regulations which involve the written request of a qualified physician. Nevertheless a good deal of trade in narcotics is still carried on through illicit channels.
Prohibition as a health measure.
Prohibition of the Liquor Traffic.—The relation of the liquor traffic to the public health is a matter upon which men have not entirely agreed; but it is a well-recognized fact that the general use of intoxicating liquors led in many cases to poverty, and poverty in turn brought under-nourishment and disease in its train. The action of the states in adopting the Eighteenth Amendment, by which the manufacture, transportation, and sale of all intoxicants is forbidden, may therefore be looked upon as a step which, in the long run, will conduce to the betterment of the public health. The excessive use of alcohol impaired the physical vigor of many thousands among the population and rendered them less capable of resisting disease. The statistics of hospitals during the period that has intervened since prohibition went into effect show that, from a health standpoint, the Eighteenth Amendment has had a beneficial effect.
Waste Disposal and Sewerage.—Every community produces each day a large amount of waste which must be collected and disposed of in a sanitary manner if the interests of the public health are to be fully protected. Some of this waste contains little or no element of danger—ashes, waste paper, and rubbish of all sorts, for example. The removal of this material is a matter of public convenience rather than of public health protection. As a rule it is drawn away and either used for filling marsh land or incinerated. |Garbage.| Another form of waste is garbage, which includes the discarded material from markets, bakeries, hotels, restaurants, and private dwellings. This garbage decomposes quickly and must be gathered at frequent intervals. In some communities the garbage is disposed of by incineration; in others it is sold to farmers for feeding swine; a few cities utilize it in reduction plants, where the grease and oil is extracted for commercial use.
Sewage.
Sewage, which includes both surface water and the liquid waste from places of human abode, is by far the most dangerous waste of all. Although it is more than ninety-nine per cent water, every ounce contains the possibility of spreading disease. |Older methods of disposal.| This effluvia, which passes through the sewers and drains, was at one time everywhere disposed of by turning it into the ocean, lakes, or rivers. Even yet many cities of the United States get rid of their sewage in that way. The method is not objectionable in the case of ocean discharge, provided the outfall sewer is carried a sufficient distance from the shore, although even in such cases some of the sewage may be borne landward by the incoming tides to pollute the shellfish beds and the beaches. The sewage of many cities along the Great Lakes is discharged into these extensive bodies of fresh water where the amount of dilution is so great that no serious harm results, provided no water for human consumption is drawn from the immediate neighborhood of the discharge points. The time will doubtless come, however, when the increasing volume of sewage will compel these cities to adopt other methods of disposal. The discharge of untreated sewage into rivers and small streams is now generally regarded as a public nuisance, and the abandonment of the practice is being required by the laws wherever practicable. Many cities, however, yet resort to this method.
Modern sewage systems.
Modern, scientific methods of sewage disposal have taken several different forms. A common plan is to conduct the sewage into huge reservoirs, basins, or tanks, where the solids are allowed to settle and form a sludge while the liquid is run off into the ocean or a lake or a river. The settling process is sometimes hastened by the use of chemicals. This does not free the waterways from danger but it is a good deal less objectionable than the practice of turning untreated sewage into them. Some cities pump the sewage upon filter beds (tracts of land which have been dug out and filled with slag or other porous substances). A few use their sewage for the irrigation of dry farming lands. No particular plan of sewage disposal can be regarded as the best under all circumstances. Local conditions differ from one community to another, and each case requires special study. Ordinarily a large town or city will produce nearly two hundred gallons of sewage per day for every man, woman, and child in its population. This means an enormous total in the course of a year and the problem of handling it safely, without excessive expense, is often a difficult one. It may well be repeated, however, that so far as the public health is concerned, sewage is the most dangerous substance known to man, and its safe disposal is one of the most important problems of the government in every civilized community.