The government of the new taxing district created a permanent board of health for the city. This new agency employed professional officers who received compensation for their service. The previous board had volunteers on its staff. This initial move became the first round in a salvo of political maneuvers aimed at fighting the plague. From November of 1878 on into May of 1879 a medley of meetings and conferences occurred throughout the affected regions. As already mentioned, they convened a meeting to rescind the city charter. That represented just the beginning. An estimated 5,150 people died in Memphis alone because of yellow fever. A disaster of that magnitude would draw in the organs of state and federal government. James D. Plunket served as president of the Tennessee State Board of Health. Dr. Plunket summoned health care leaders from the area to a two-day meeting in Memphis on April 30. This meeting resulted in the formation of the Sanitary Council of the Mississippi Valley. The Chamber of Commerce and the cotton exchange also convened a meeting on May 22. The members of this meeting organized the Auxiliary Sanitary Association of Memphis. The events of following months would give added authority to the Tennessee Board of Health, and the National Board of Health would also emerge as a powerful broker of public health in the growing nation. These agencies endeavored to address the problem of poor sanitation in Memphis. An irony surrounds this fact. Filth did not directly contribute to the spread of yellow fever. This disease often struck clean neighborhoods, but the elimination of unsanitary conditions would radically reduce the spread of other illnesses such as dysentery, typhoid and cholera. These diseases undoubtedly did result from filth, and they killed more people than did yellow fever. Another commission organized later in the century would reveal the dark secrets of the saffron scourge.
Posted on: Sun, 25 Aug 2013 20:42:32 +0000
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