EXPERIENCES OF THE NEW YORK HEALTH DEPARTMENT IN TYPHOID IMMUNIZATION

Preventive medicine, despite its brilliant advances in recent days, has met momentary checks, when, as happens from time to time, some apparent instances of its failure to protect from disease have come to light. That element of our lay population which suffers from constitutional timidity and which can be induced only with difficulty, if at all, to adopt the teachings of this newest and most helpful branch of medicine, jumps eagerly at these apparent examples of failure. It makes them serve as justification for relapsing into the helpless and fatalistic attitude toward disease which has come down through the centuries from the dark ages. These particular instances of the so-called miscarriages of prophylactic medicine are trumpeted far and wide and marshaled to serve as evidence against its value, long years after impartial scientists have disproved all criticism and vindicated the signal virtues of this newest department of medical science.