Pestilence Stoppers

After World War I, the pale horse of pestilence galloped unchecked across Europe. How many people died from influenza, typhus, relapsing fever, malaria, typhoid and smallpox was never recorded, but flu alone killed an estimated 16,000,000. After World War II, the pale horse and his rider never really got started. Health authorities think it was partly a matter of luck. But Europe's, and Asia's, amazing escape from pestilence was also partly due to UNRRA. The story of its great work was told last week in a final bulletin by its health division.

UNRRA had only a tiny medical staff: about 600 doctors, 600 nurses, 60 sanitary engineers, 40 dentists. But it had plenty of miracle workers like DDT and penicillin. To trouble spots, UNRRA shipped: 7.5 million pounds of DDT powder, 809,550 million units of penicillin, one million pounds of sulfa drugs, six million cc of diphtheria toxoid, 5,167 million units of antitoxin. By 1946's end, UNRRA reported, typhoid, which had caused Europe's most serious postwar epidemic, was under control, diphtheria had been greatly reduced, typhus was rare, smallpox and plague had virtually been wiped out.

P: In Poland, one of the hardest hit by disease, there were severe typhoid and typhus outbreaks, but by improving sanitation and shipping in enough DDT to delouse every inhabitant, UNRRA stopped both. In 1946, Poland had only 3,500 typhus cases (v. 168,000 in 1920).

P: In China, UNRRA doctors and sanitary engineers helped to contain cholera, bubonic plague, kala azar (black fever, borne by sand flies, which were attacked with DDT).

P: In Greece, where malaria has been endemic for centuries, a DDT campaign against mosquitoes (including the spraying of 300,000 houses and stables) gave protection to 80% of the population.

P:In Taranto, Italy, UNRRA quickly suppressed an outbreak of bubonic plague.

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