I found this while I was looking at all the 1918 reports and it's where my signature line came from.
I guess we didn't listen so well because we are still woefully unprepared, still spending billions on whatever issues are deemed more important, while our funding for pandemic preparation is so comparatively limited.
Louis Harris would probably be sad if he knew his words went so unheeded.
--------------------------------------------------------------
THE ULTIMATE BENEFITS TO BE DERIVED FROM THE EPIDEMIC
Louis I. HARRIS, D. P. H., M. D.,
Department of Health, New York City
[snips]
Each of us should go back to our respective communities and urge and plead with all possible emphasis that the 350,000 and more deaths caused by the now waning epidemic in this country shall not pass from memory without leading to a drastic reorganization of public health work in every town, city and state, and in the Federal government as well.
Let us make it known that we were not properly prepared to meetthe emergency, and let us not permit the significance of the facts revealing our handicaps and short comings to be minimized.
Let it be known that our hospital facilities were not organized to meet the situation, and that the lack of proper governmental control over these agencies caused no end of confusion and suffering.
The salvage of human life ought to be placed above barter and exchange. Shall we not in our reorganization provide so as to be prepared to meet a recrudescence of fhe epidemic or the development of a new emergency?
Shall we, as a nation who have unstintingly given billions for the conduct of war, plead economy and withhold the much smaller sums needed to make possible the protection of, human life on a decent scale?
We should take the lessons of the epidemic to heart and go back to our respective communities and demand the apportionment of money for every justified expenditure for the organization of preventive measures, medical care and relief. We should demand that the moraleof every local and state organization be raised to the highest standard possible and be safe from political, personal or other petty disturbance,...
Let this night mark the beginning of a persistent and unremitting propaganda carried on by this Association to bring home to every community the need of increasing its appropriations and its personnel, to the end that human life may be better protected.
In this way only may some measure of good be derived from thetragedy out of which we are apparently just emerging.
Full article: http://www.ajph.org/cgi/reprint/9/1/41.pdf
I guess we didn't listen so well because we are still woefully unprepared, still spending billions on whatever issues are deemed more important, while our funding for pandemic preparation is so comparatively limited.
Louis Harris would probably be sad if he knew his words went so unheeded.
--------------------------------------------------------------
THE ULTIMATE BENEFITS TO BE DERIVED FROM THE EPIDEMIC
Louis I. HARRIS, D. P. H., M. D.,
Department of Health, New York City
[snips]
Each of us should go back to our respective communities and urge and plead with all possible emphasis that the 350,000 and more deaths caused by the now waning epidemic in this country shall not pass from memory without leading to a drastic reorganization of public health work in every town, city and state, and in the Federal government as well.
Let us make it known that we were not properly prepared to meetthe emergency, and let us not permit the significance of the facts revealing our handicaps and short comings to be minimized.
Let it be known that our hospital facilities were not organized to meet the situation, and that the lack of proper governmental control over these agencies caused no end of confusion and suffering.
The salvage of human life ought to be placed above barter and exchange. Shall we not in our reorganization provide so as to be prepared to meet a recrudescence of fhe epidemic or the development of a new emergency?
Shall we, as a nation who have unstintingly given billions for the conduct of war, plead economy and withhold the much smaller sums needed to make possible the protection of, human life on a decent scale?
We should take the lessons of the epidemic to heart and go back to our respective communities and demand the apportionment of money for every justified expenditure for the organization of preventive measures, medical care and relief. We should demand that the moraleof every local and state organization be raised to the highest standard possible and be safe from political, personal or other petty disturbance,...
Let this night mark the beginning of a persistent and unremitting propaganda carried on by this Association to bring home to every community the need of increasing its appropriations and its personnel, to the end that human life may be better protected.
In this way only may some measure of good be derived from thetragedy out of which we are apparently just emerging.
Full article: http://www.ajph.org/cgi/reprint/9/1/41.pdf