640999-1895-Plague-in-Tungkun-Dr-Westcott-s-Report — Page 1

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THE HONGKONG

Government Gazette.

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Published by Authority.

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No. 2.

VICTORIA, SATURDAY, 12TH JANUARY, 1895.

VOL. LXI.

號二第

日七十月二十年午甲 日二十月正年五十九百八千一 簿一十四第

GOVERNMENT NOTIFICATION.-No. 8.

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The following report by Surgeon-Major WESTCOTT, A.M.S., on the subject of the existence of Plague in Tung Kun is published.

By Command,

Colonial Secretary's Office, Hongkong, 10th January, 1895.

J. H. STEWART LOCKHART,

Acting Colonial Secretary.

(From Surgeon-Major S. Westcott, A.M.S., to The Colonial Secretary, Hongkong.)

HONGKONG, 7th January, 1895.

SIR.I have the honour to report that I proceeded to Tung Kun on the 27th ultimo to investigate the disease stated to be prevalent there.

I was accompanied from Canton by Mr. F. S. A. BOURNE, the Vice-Consul at that port.

At Tung

Kun on the 31st December, I interviewed Dr. KÜHNE of the Rhenish Mission, who had been resident

at the Mission Hospital for the last seven years, and he informed me

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1. That the Chinese Doctor at Shek Lung, a large town on the East river, 8 miles N.W. of Tung Kun, was at Tung Kun on the 29th November, 1894, and reported that he had heard about several cases of plague in Shek Lung, and that he had had one case under his own treatment which died in 3 days, the axillary glands being affected.

2. That he had heard from his Chinese teacher that in Tung Kun on the 3rd December a boy 10 years old came to the Hospital grounds from the country to see some friends, and in the evening he became ill and died on the following night from high temperature and syncope. His grandmother, living in the same house, became ill 6 days afterwards, and on the second day of the disease, she sent to borrow Dr. KÜHNE'S clinical ther:no- meter, which, on return, registered 102°; she died on the third day and her family circulated a report that the Doctor's thermometer had caused her axillary glands to swell.

3. That on the afternoon of the 10th December a Chinaman was selling sugar and water in

the streets, and in the evening he was dead of "season disease.”

4. That in one street near the N. gate six people in one family died at about the same date. 5. That he (Dr. KüпNE) had noticed that many rats died in the Hospital premises two

months ago.

6. That on the 16th December the scavenger reported that 30 coffins passed one of the gates

in one day.

Dr. KÜHNE being unable to give any evidence of the existence of plague at the present time, kindly placed his Chinese Medical Assistant, and Chinese Teacher, (who is also a medical practitioner in the town) at my disposal, and I sent these men and also the native of the town, who was sent from Hongkong with me, to try to discover if the inhabitants were dying in unusual numbers from any disease, and I offered a reward of $10 to any one who would show me a case of plague in any stage, or a body dead of the disease. They reported next day that they were unable to discover any case, and that no unusual sickness prevailed.

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