Typhus Fever

Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)

a contagious fever, which occurs mainly in temperate and cold climates, and often rages as an epidemic. It is also known as "spotted," "epidemic," or "contagious" fever, and was formerly called "camp" or "gaol" fever from its prevalence in camps and prisons. The recurrence of typhus in times of war or of famine is due to the overcrowding and lack of cleanliness that often exist. Contagion is ordinarily through the medium of the body louse, which becomes infected from biting a typhus sufferer and transmits the disease to another. It is not communicated from the clothes or excreta, and so, by properly isolating the patient, the spread of the fever may be prevented. The period of incubation is supposed to range from a few hours to several days. The earliest symptoms are heaviness and listlessness, with a confusion of ideas, which afterward develops into delirium; an eruption of round, dark, reddish-brown spots then makes its appearance, the temperature is high, the pulse very rapiu, and the patient suffers from extreme weakness. The condition of the bowels varies in different patients, for there may be either diarrhea or constipation. The duration of an uncomplicated case of typhus varies from 12 to 21 days. The greatest danger is usually during the second week of the illness, death seldom ensuing before the seventh day. The treatment of typhus consists in placing the patient under the best possible hygienic conditions, keeping up the strength with beef tea, mutton broth, eggs, arrowroot, etc., and in alleviating the most prominent and distressing symtoms, such as relieving thirst, by the free administration of cooling drinks, controlling sleeplessness, headache, and delirium by small doses of opium, keeping the bowels open by mild laxatives, etc. Stimulants should not be given to chil dren, and many adults do well without them, but alcohol may be advantageously used in the case of old persons, or where the patient has been accustomed to the free use of stimulants. When recovery takes place, it is generally very rapid, a great change in the condition of the patient often occurring in 24 or 48 hours. The only complication at all common is a form of pneumonia. Typhus was one of the scourges of the World War. It followed invasion in Serbia in 1914-1915, and was prevalent in Russia and in southeastern and central Europe in 1919- 1920, following pre-war conditions.