Badly Sanitated Africa

The Army's Surgeon General, James C. Magee, back last week from an inspection trip in Africa, described a triumph of U.S. medicine. "North Africa," said he, "is not a well-sanitated place. For instance, within one small walled native town, we found plague, leprosy, smallpox, typhoid, typhus, two or three kinds of dysentery and just about all the skin diseases known." ("Some parts of the world," he added, "just refuse to regard venereal disease as a problem.") But in spite of these conditions, in spite of long, hard-working days, dampness and mud, Army sickness rate in Africa is only 1%.*

The Army has accomplished this by several means. It keeps the troops out of native quarters. It keeps malaria satisfactorily at bay with atabrine and quinine (TIME, Feb. 1). Typhus is avoided by systematic delousing of men. (Details of the Army's latest clothing decontamination method -- treatment with methyl bromide in the active state--are a Medical Corps secret.) Without much help from local African authorities, the Army fights venereal disease by exhortation, prophylaxis and the latest therapies.

* This cannot be fairly compared to the 3% rate at home because soldiers in war theaters do not report minor illnesses for which soldiers at home are sent to bed.

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