The importance of taking swabs from the throats of schoolchildren for the controlling of diphtheria has not been fully recognized by a number of public health officers. In one section of Kansas City, Kan., called Argentine, we have a district that is isolated by natural boundaries. The Kansas River bounds this district on the north and east, while large hills form a natural boundary on the west and south. The retail trade, the milk supply and the school system are all confined within these limits.
Oct. 1, 1919, we had fourteen cases of diphtheria in this district and none in the rest of the city. We took cultures of the schoolchildren, 367 in all, and found thirty-four carriers. One of these was a child who had had diphtheria one month previously and had been released from quarantine after having had only one negative culture. This child had been given antitoxin