RT Journal
A1 Hammond HS
T1 COntagion and consistency—a rejoinder
JF Journal of the American Medical Association
JO Journal of the American Medical Association
YR 1909
FD August 14
VO LIII
IS 7
SP 572
OP 572
DO 10.1001/jama.1909.02550070076016
UL http://dx.doi.org/10.1001/jama.1909.02550070076016
AB To the Editor: 
    —I note in The Journal, July 24, a communication from Dr. Emil Roy on "Contagion and Consistency." It is not improper to remark that the writer would do well to show in his statements some consistency with the real facts which are being brought out in investigations of infectious diseases. Such statements as: "Clothing and other fomites are great carriers of infection," and "infected clothing that has been unused for years has been the cause of epidemics," are admitted by authorities, well able to judge, to be made entirely without sufficient grounds, and there is yet to be recorded a single satisfactory substantiated instance that shows such to be the case.As stated recently by Dr. A. H. Doty, health officer of the Port of New York, in the American Journal of Medical Sciences, the old custom of attributing every obscure source of infection to fomites, has