Sunlight For The Sick
Dr. Wm. H. Hammond, in discussing the sanitary influence of íight, observes that the effects of deficiënt light upon the inmates of hospitul warda and sick chainbers have frequently come under hig special notice ; that most physioians know how carefully the attendants upon tho aiok endeavor to exclude every ray of light from the apartment, and even some members of the profession are aingularly assiduous in this respect ; but that the practice, except in some cases of actual disorder of the brain and other parts of the nervous system, ia pernicious, admita of no question. During the late civil war Dr. H. visited a camp and hospital in West Virginia, in consequence of information received that the sickness and mortality there prevailing were unao countably great, and he made a minute examination into all the circumstances connected with tbe situation of the camp, the food of the men, etc. Among other peculiarities he found the sick crowded into a small room, trom which the light was excluded by blinds of India-rubber cloth. The patients were aa effectually bleached as is oelery by the earth being heapud up around it ; pale, bloodless, ghost-like looking forms, they seemed to be scarcely mortal. Convalescence was, under such circumstances, accordiug to Dr. Hammond, almost impossible, and his belief was that many of the men had died, who, had they been subjected to the operation of the simplest laws of nature, would huve recovered.
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Old News
Michigan Argus