QUARANTINE IN THE BRITISH WEST INDIES
By adopting "the recommendations of the West
Indian Inter-colonial Sanitary Convention of 1904, recently held at Barbadoes, the British colonies in these
parts have at one leap emerged, in the matter of dealing with infected ships, from practices not altogether unlike those prescribed by the Venetians of the 14th
century to a modern system of marine sanitation based
upon the present day knowledge of the causation and mode
of spread of infectious disease. It v/as certainly
fitting that this change should have taken place at a
time when the epidemiology of our tropical colonies is
receiving special attention, and when excellent work
is being done, under the aegis of the Colonial Office,
by the Commissioners of the London and Liverpool schools
of Tropical Medicine, towards improving the public
health of the more notoriously insalubrious portions of
the Empire, thereby facilitating the development of
commercial resources hitherto exploited with difficulty
on account of the prevalence in those regions of strange
and fatal diseases, the nature and origin of which,
though now becoming apparent as a result of untiring research, have been, unfortunately, but little understood in the past. This removal of the barrier of Quarantine
from the path of free inter-colonial trade, in times of
epidemic disease, and the substitution for it of the
more rational methods of dealing with infected ships
now agreed upon, is remarkable as being one of the
most striking instances yet afforded of the application
of modern sanitary science to .the principles-of the
new Imperial idea, the mainspring of which, as I understand it, is to foster closer and freer commercial
relationships, not only between the Mother Country and
the rest of the Empire, but between the various colonies
themselves. It was also fitting that the Delegates to
that Convention should have been guided in their deliberations by a medical expert from the Local Government Board of England, specially commissioned to do so
after visiting the different islands, and making himself personally acquainted with local conditions affecting the Public Health. The appointment of this Imperial officer may be taken as something in the nature of
an atonement on the part of Downing street for having
allowed to endure, during a period of forty years after
its disuse in the United Kingdom, a mischievous practice
introduced in this Colony by an Order in Council
dated 10th November 1818, which "proclaimed and declared
that the same Regulations, Provisions, Pains, Penalties
and Forfeitures for the due performance of quarantine
shall be held to be in force within this island, its
Forts, Harbours, Maritime Jurisdiction, and its Dependencies, as are now in force in Great Britain, in virtue of several Acts of Parliament of the United Kingdom,
and of the.Order of *His Majesty in Council".
The immediate reason for the promulgation of
this Order as recited in the Proclamation issued at the time was as follows:- "Whereas information has been
"obtained that the smallpox prevails is the neighbouring"provinces of Spanish America, and it becomes necessary
for the preservation off the Public Health to provide
"against the contagion thereof in this island, either
"from the vessels that now have arrived or hereafter may
'arrive at this port, either from the said Provinces or "elsewhere wheresoever". Information is wanting as to
whether the quarantine regulations successfully fulfilled
their object on that occasion; certainly they failed to
do so a year ago when, as a result of infection from
Venezuela, Trinidad was the scene of an out-break of
smallpox in which upwards of four thousand cases were
recorded.
THE SMALL-POX CONTROVERSY OF 1902-04
Before dealing with the controversy on the
recent epidemic of small-pox, it will be necessary to
say a few words regarding the disease itself. I
would like to mention that what follows is not a
collection of facts made up in the light of informa¬
tion acquired after the disease had been widely dis¬
cussed in all its aspects, and authoritative opinion
favourable to my contention finally accepted, but in
beality an extended copy of notes made at an early ,
stage of the controversy, and intended for publication
in the British Medical Journal.
Bearing in mind the uncertain protection afforded by the enforcement of quarantine, it vias generally feared that the epidemic of.smallpox which had broken out in Barbados during the summer of 1902 would
sooner or later spread to Trinidad, This feeling was
amply justified before the end of the year when, on November 8th, I discovered five persons suffering from the
disease at No.45, Duncan street, in Port of Spain, the
Capital city of the island.
