Some few remarks may be made on the subject of primary syphilis. The proportion of the cases of this malady to the gross number of patients treated was in
| 1854 | 149⁄10 | per cent. | |
| 1855 | 252⁄10 | " | |
| 1856 | 312⁄10 | " | |
| 1857 | 279⁄10 | " |
By the term “primary syphilis,” non-professional readers will understand the commencement of the disease, or symptoms which are the direct consequence of an impure connection, in contradistinction to “secondary syphilis,” which is the comparatively remote result of infection; never appearing until after the primary symptoms are well developed, and frequently not until all traces of them are removed. He will thus see that every case of primary syphilis is in itself a proof of recent intercourse with a diseased person. These cases, then, have increased from 15 per cent. in 1854 to 31¼ per cent. in 1856, and 28 per cent. in 1857. The remarks recently quoted explain how 882 cases in 1857 make a smaller percentage than 650 in 1856. The fact of this increase compels us to but one conclusion, and that is a very important and suggestive one, namely, that commerce with prostitutes in 1857 was attended with nearly twice the risk of infection incurred in 1854; and, of course, the health of abandoned women has deteriorated in the same proportion. This is not said with any wish on the part of the writer to be considered an alarmist. The facts are those which have come under his personal observation: the inference is but a plain and natural deduction.
But the Hospital, although the chief, is not the only institution on Blackwell’s Island where patients are treated for venereal disease. The Alms-house, Work-house, and Penitentiary have each a share of sufferers from this malady, to what extent will be shown by the annexed table:
| 1854. | 1855. | 1856. | 1857. | |||||
| Alms-house | 33 | 173 | 85 | 52 | ||||
| Work-house | 65 | 31 | 5 | 56 | ||||
| Penitentiary | 176 | 234 | 430 | |||||
Bellevue Hospital, New York City, also under charge of the Governors of the Alms-house, is not professedly available to venereal cases. By a report from the Medical Board of that institution, which will be found in the next chapter, it is seen that they estimate “not far from 10 per cent. of the inmates of Bellevue Hospital are admitted for affections which have their origin remotely in venereal disease.” These data are sufficient to fix the numbers thus treated as follows:
| Year. | Total number of patients. | 10 per cent for venereal cases. | ||
| 1854 | 7033 | 703 | ||
| 1855 | 6697 | 670 | ||
| 1856 | 6392 | 639 | ||
| 1857 | 7676 | 768 |
In regard to the Nursery Hospital on Randall’s Island, it is stated by Dr. H. N. Whittlesey, the Resident Physician, that “nine tenths of all diseases treated in this hospital during the past five years have been of constitutional origin, and for the most part hereditary. The exact proportion which hereditary syphilis bears to this sum of constitutional depravity can not be stated with accuracy.” It is an estimate far within the bounds of probability to assume that one half of the diseases referred to by Dr. Whittlesey are complicated with or by syphilitic taint, and the numbers in the Nursery Hospital will therefore stand as follows:
| Year. | Total number of patients. | 50 per cent for venereal cases. | ||
| 1854 | 2199 | 1100 | ||
| 1855 | 2310 | 1155 | ||
| 1856 | 1275 | 638 | ||
| 1857 | 1469 | 734 |