INTRODUCTION.

The attendance upon the third annual school for health officers was larger than upon either of the previous ones. The interest manifested by those in attendance was enthusiastic and continued through all the sessions of the school. It is to be regretted that so many towns were unrepresented, either by their health officer or some member of their local board of health. These unrepresented towns were the smaller towns; how much their pecuniary loss will be, or how much their death rate might have been reduced by the knowledge their health officer might have gained, cannot be told. It would seem that every person in the state who gives only a limited consideration to the general health of his neighborhood or town would see the importance of having a person for health officer who had at least availed himself of some means of gathering a sufficient knowledge of general sanitary laws sufficient to enable him to execute the laws enacted by the legislature of the state in an intelligent manner. At the present time there are no schools where sanitary science or the duties of health officers are taught, and books upon hygiene are not readily accessible, owing to the fact that they are expensive publications, hence the only means at hand whereby a large number of the local health boards of the state can inform themselves is by attending this school instituted under the authority conferred by legislative enactment, upon the State Board of Health. It is the towns whose villages are small, most of the inhabitants living on farms, that will derive the most benefit from this diffusion of sanitary knowledge. The cities and most of the large villages have officials whose duty it is to look after their sanitary condition. The fact that these cities and villages have larger grand lists and consequently are able to better compensate their health officials, enables these officers to purchase such publications as will give them a better preparation for their work than can be acquired by their less fortunate colleagues. For these reasons we venture to hope that at the next annual school for health officers we shall see all of the small towns represented, to the extent that the whole state may be put in as thorough a sanitary condition as possible. The more thorough we are in everything that tends to improve our hygienic status the lower our death rate will be, the less will be the suffering and anguish in our homes, and the greater the sum of happiness.

A careful reading of Dr. Caverly's remarks, published in this Bulletin, in which he shows the death rate from certain diseases during the five years before the State Board of Health was established, and that from the same diseases in the last five years, is instructive. Taking the two diseases, scarlet fever and diphtheria, the lessened mortality resulted in saving the lives of six hundred and fifty-eight persons. Leaving out the worth of each life to the state and the sorrow and misery which would have come to the families if these persons had died, we can approximately compute the financial savings for medical attendance, nursing and funeral expenses. Placing these three items at an average of sixty dollars for each person,

we have the sum of thirty-nine thousand four hundred and eighty dollars, the sum which is nearly twelve hundred dollars more than has been expended for expenses of the State Board for the fourteen years of its existence.

Other bulletins of this series will be published from time to time which will include all the papers and discussions presented at the school of health officers. Other subjects will also be presented.

STATE BOARD OF HEALTH.

Brattleboro, Sept. 2, 1901.

HENRY D. HOLTON, Secretary.