The following directions, prepared from instructions published by the Association of Medical Officers of Health in London, will be found useful for the prevention of the spread of infectious diseases: -

"When a person is attacked, one of two things should immediately be done. The sick person should either be put into a room, apart from others, the room being stripped first of all carpets, curtains, and unnecessary furniture, or where this cannot be done, should be sent to hospital.

" When possible, all persons who have not had the disease should be sent out of the house to lodge elsewhere.

" The infectious principle of the disease is given off by the breath, and by all the discharges of the sick person; also from the skin until long after apparent recovery, so long indeed as any roughness remains upon it.

" Persons with sore throat, when scarlet fever is about, sometimes give scarlet fever to other people.

" To prevent it coming off by the breath, the mouth, throat, and nose should be very frequently washed with a disinfecting solution, such as water containing some Condy's fluid or chloride of soda, by gargling, swabbing, or syringing.

" All vessels intended to receive the discharges from the bowels, etc., should have a dessert-spoonful of carbolic acid with a little water constantly kept in them.

" Rags should be used instead of handkerchiefs for removing or wiping away the discharges from the throat or nose, and they should then be burned.

" The air of the room should be kept sweet and disinfected, and prevented from mixing with the other air of the house. This may be done by constantly keeping up a small fire, or by hanging over the doorway an old sheet well sprinkled with carbolic acid, or by both these methods.

"No unnecessary communication should take place between the nurse in the sick-room and the other inmates of the house. Nurses or attendants should wear glazed or smooth dresses in preference to rough and woollen ones, and should wash their hands before eating.

"All handkerchiefs, towels, sheets, articles of clothing, etc., should be steeped in boiling water containing carbolic acid, or Condy's fluid, or chloride of soda (a teaspoonful to the gallon), before they are taken out of the sick room.

"Whenever slops from the sick room are thrown down closets, sinks, or drains, a teaspoonful of carbolic acid in a basinful of water should be thrown down after them".

During Recovery And Convalescence

"Warm baths with soap should be used repeatedly until all roughness of the skin has disappeared: a little carbolic acid added renders the washing more effective for disinfection.

" Until all roughness of the skin has disappeared, the person should not be allowed to mix with the rest of the family, and then only in new clothes, or in clothes which have been thoroughly disinfected".

In The Event Of A Fatal Termination

" The body should not be removed into another room to spread infection over the house. It is still infectious.

" No articles of bedding or clothing should be removed from the room until disinfected as formerly stated.

"In washing the body, carbolic acid (a dessert-spoonful to the gallon of water) should be used.

"The body should be put into the coffm as soon as possible, with a disinfectant. Macdougafs powder may be used, sprinkled freely underneath and over the corpse, or rags soaked in strong carbolic acid may be laid beneath it and over it (beneath the clothing). The coffin should be screwed down and the body buried as soon as possible.".

Subsequent Disinfection Of The House, Etc

" The infection hangs about a room or house for a very long time, and is difficult to dislodge. Fumigation by sulphur, however, may be employed by any one, the paper being previously wetted with carbolic acid, stripped off, and burned. A quarter of a pound of brimstone, broken into small pieces, should be put into an iron dish (or a lid of an iron saucepan turned upside down) supported by a pair of tongs over a bucket of water. The fireplace and outer openings, such as the crevices of the windows, are then to be closed by pasting paper over them, and a shovelful of live coals is to be put upon the brimstone. The door is then to be quickly shut, the crevices pasted up with paper, and the room kept closed for five or six hours. Articles of clothing hung up loosely, or left uncovered in the room, are fumigated at the same time.

"After this, a thorough cleaning should be made; everything that can be, washed with a little carbolic acid in the water, and boiled. The room should then be lime-washed, and afterwards left unoccupied with the windows open for a week or a fortnight".