Sanitation in Panama

by William Crawford Gorgas

Old French Engine Tender Used as Storage Tank for Oil

Mule for Packing Oil to Oilers.

The inspector must become very familiar with the half-dozen most frequently occurring larvæ in his district; he must recognize them easily when he sees them, and must know the kind of locality in which to seek for them. He must learn the peculiarity of ditching as applied to drainage intended to prevent mosquito breeding. This is quite an art in itself. Take, for instance, an ordinary depression between two small hills; if we want merely to get the water away for ordinary drainage purposes, a ditch through the center will accomplish this, but sometimes where the water is oozing through the surface on the hillside, you still have soft moist places on each side of your ditch which makes most excellent breeding-places for mosquitoes.

Mr. Le Prince discovered that for mosquito work ditches would have to be run along the hillside to cut off the water from this soft ground and to catch it when it came to the surface. Where the ordinary engineer does ditching, such a detail as this is overlooked by him.

Wherever possible, I insisted upon the sanitary inspector who was instructed in these matters doing his own work, using men employed directly by himself and under his orders and supervision. I think it is of the utmost importance in mosquito work that the health officer should have direct control of the men doing this work. The ordinary engineer has no special knowledge of the life history of the mosquito, and as the ditching and brush-cutting are done to prevent mosquito-breeding, it is not surprising that it is not successfully done by a man who has no knowledge of the mosquito.

All the work at Havana was done by men trained and instructed as to the life habits of the mosquito, and the same was the case for the first three years at Panama, when the effective mosquito work was done. Whenever speaking or writing on this subject I have insisted upon the necessity of having the execution of the work in the hands of men who have been trained in anti-malarial procedure.

Another duty of the inspector was to see that the houses were properly screened, and that the screens were kept in effective condition. The Commission had several thousand buildings scattered in thirty or more towns, and it endeavored to keep all these buildings mosquito-proof with wire netting. Mr. Wright, the architect of the Commission, developed several very useful types of houses, well adapted to a tropical country and for the use of wire netting. The general plan was not to attempt to screen the doors and windows; such screening is more or less imperfect, and with several entrances to a house, it is impossible with any ordinary care to prevent the doors being left open. Mr. Wright therefore planned his houses so that they were screened in, having only one door of entrance. A house screened in this way is very thoroughly protected against the mosquito. The housekeeper, with very little attention, can keep closed the one screen door that gives entrance to the house.

Another great advantage of such screening is that there is very little interference with the circulation of the air. We used a wire netting of sixteen strands to the inch. In the case of a window screened with such wire, a large part of the air that would ordinarily enter is kept out, and the interior of the house is made hot and uncomfortable in a warm climate. With the whole side of the veranda screened the amount of air kept out is not appreciable, and at Panama there was no complaint that the screening interfered with the ventilation.