On the sanitation of armies on active service in the field

Abstract

I have endeavoured to outline a scheme of sanitation feasible under the conditions of active service in the field. Provided the execution of such measures is supervised by officers and men trained to such special duty; provided their performance is carried out wholeheartedly by each individual as the result of individual enlightenment and training; provided all necessary appliances are generously furnished: I do not think it Utopian to believe that the disease-rate and the disease death-rate in our army might be reduced to a fraction of what has been experienced in the past in the several campaigns in Egypt, in South Africa, and on the Indian frontier. Were such precautions adopted as an invariable routine and furthered by each man's personal efforts, our army, like that of Japan in Manchuria, would achieve results beyond what can ever be secured by mere courage and discipline on the one hand, mere leadership and strategy on the other. We might send our men on foreign expeditions confident that none would suffer from remediable evils in his environment; we might safely reduce our hospital accommodation and our provision for sick transport, thereby securing to the wounded an increase of comfort and attention. The protection of our own shores and of our colonies would be facilitated. " We might even smile at the thought of an invasion of India, secure in the knowledge that while the health of our army was maintained by an efficient sanitary corps, that of the enemy would be decimated by water-borne disease" (144). As was granted at the outset, the military sanitarian must base his proposals on practical and tactical considerations. But, as was shown, philanthropic objects are achieved by the same means. The success of the combatant branches must usually be bought by bloodshed, must ever be proportioned to the loss inflicted upon the foe. With the efforts of the military sanitarian it is far otherwise. In so far as he is successful, death and suffering are diminished. As contrasted with the heroic death in battle, the futile loss of life from inglorious disease is saved. "Sanity" and humanity go hand in hand; what secures the one secures the other.