Preventive Medicine in World War II. Vol. II, Environmental Hygiene

This volume is the first of a series to be published recording the accomplishments of various divisions of the Preventive Medicine Service of the U.S. Army during World War II. The whole story of these accomplishments , which took a variety of forms and were carried out in combat on many fronts, is a record of how preventive medicine grew mightily during the past generation and particularly during the twenty-two years between World War I and World War II. It will stand as a monument to the late General James S. Simmons, who directed the program from the Office of the Surgeon General of the Army. This particular volume deals specifically with that portion of the program which comes under the broad term of "Environmental Hygiene." Since early antiquity, wise military leaders have recognized the importance of maintaining a high standard of cleanliness among their troops. The practical application of this ideal was improved when new knowledge based on microbiology and epidemiology showed that the broad term of "cleanli-ness" could be applied specifically to the prevention of disease through sanitation of the environment. The extraordinary degree to which these practical applications not only kept pace with the rapid development of knowledge, but were used in the field of military medicine, was one of the most remarkable achievements in World War II and one which resulted in the prevention of disease to a larger extent than it is perhaps possible to measure or even imagine. The story is told here largely by two Army Officers of considerable experience: Col. T. F. Whayne of the Medical Corps, and Col. W. A. Hardenberg of the Sanitary Corps. The chapters cover the military aspects of: food management-as carried out in the U.S. Army in World War II; housing; water purification; waste disposal; the control of insects; foreign quarantine; and the practice of preventive medicine in ports of embarkation and for persons in transit. Into these fields many new principles and new methods have found their way to keep pace with the demands which our modern civilization makes for controlling the environment for purposes of health. Perhaps none of these fields has undergone as sudden a transformation as that of the control of insect vectors of disease such as mosquitoes, lice, and sand flies. Outstanding therefore, among special features in the preventive medicine program in World War II was the initiation of research which led …