THE SANITARIUM AT TABOGA INHERITED FROM THE FRENCH
Making the hospital attractive was one of the points insisted upon by Col. Gorgas. Some of the doctors think that possibly it has been a wee bit overdone. Some of the folks along the Zone look on a brief space spent in the hospital as a pleasant interlude in an otherwise monotonous life. As they have thirty days’ sick leave with pay every year they are quite prone to turn to the pleasant slopes of Ancon Hill, with a week at the charming sanitarium on Taboga Island as a fitting close—a sort of café parfait to top off the feast. Surgery even seems to have lost its terrors there. “Why, they even bring their friends to be operated on”, said one of the surgeons laughingly when talking of the popularity of the hospital among the Zone dwellers.
A FETE DAY AT TABOGA
FEATHER PALM AT ANCON
Charity cases have numbered as many as 66,000 a year and the records show that during the period of greatest activity on the Zone as many as 70 different nationalities were ministered to. The question of color was often an embarrassing one. The gradations of shades between pure white to darkest African is so exceedingly delicate in Panama that there is always difficulty in determining whether the subject under consideration belongs to the “gold” or the “silver” class, for the words black and white are tactfully avoided in the Zone in their reference to complexions. “This is my plan”, said Col. Mason in charge of the hospital. “On certain days the patients are allowed visitors. When the color of the inmate is problematical, as is usually the case with women, I ask if she wants her husband to visit her. If she does and he proves to be a negro, she goes into the colored ward. If she still insists that she is white, she can go into the white ward, but must dispense with his visits”.
Under our treaty the Zone sanitary department takes charge of the insane of Colon and Panama, and a very considerable share of the grounds at Ancon is divided off with barbed wire for their use. The number of patients runs well into the hundreds, with very few Americans. Most are Jamaica negroes and the hospital authorities say that they are mentally unbalanced by the rush and excitement of life on the Zone. I never happened to see a Jamaica negro excited unless it happened to be a Tivoli Hotel waiter confronted with the awful responsibility of an extra guest at table. Then the excitement took the form of deep melancholy, exaggerated lethargy, and signs of suicidal mania in every facial expression.
Beside the hospital service the sanitary department maintains dispensaries at several points on the line, where necessary drugs are provided for patients in the Commission Service free. Patent medicines are frowned upon, and such as are purveyed must be bought through the Commissary. Medical service is free to employees and their families. All doctors practicing on the Zone are on the gold payroll for wages ranging from $1800 to $7000 a year. I could not find upon inquiry that the fact that they were not dependent upon the patient for payment made the doctors less alert or sympathetic. At least no complaints to that effect were current.