CDC History of Tuberculosis Control - Medical and Public Health ...

grams that was emulated by other health
departments across the country and laid the
groundwork for a campaign called the “War
on Consumption.”
During the first part of the 20th century, great
emphasis was placed on improving social
conditions and educating the general public
about good hygiene and health habits. If you
went to public school anytime between 1900
and 1930, you got the TB message, which said
essentially that spit is death. In hospitals it
was common to see signs that read “Spit Is
Poison.” Notices were plainly printed in
public places and government buildings that
stated “Do Not Spit on the Floor; To Do So
May Spread Disease.”
In the 1920s, when fresh
air and bed rest did not
secure improvement in
the patient’s condition,
physicians sometimes
performed surgery or
collapsed one of the
lungs (pneumothorax).
During this time there
were many other “surecure”
remedies being advertised by many firms
and physicians.
In 1902 at the first International Conference
on Tuberculosis held in Paris, Dr. Gilbert
Sersiron suggested the adoption of the Cross
of Lorraine, used by the Knights of the First
Crusade, as the symbol of a new movement, a
crusade for good health against sickness and
death, and against TB. The double-barred cross
was adopted as the international symbol for
the fight against TB. This symbol was later
adopted in 1904 in the United States by the
forerunner of the American Lung Association.
It was not until the turn of the century that
private voluntary groups in the United States
joined the fight against TB. In April 1892, Dr.
Lawrence F. Flick organized the first American
voluntary anti-TB organization, the
TB Control at the Millennium
4
Pennsylvania Society for Prevention of Tuberculosis.
The organization was instrumental in
helping organize free hospitals for poor consumptive
patients in Philadelphia. In 1902,
Dr. S. Adolphus Knopf of New York was one
of the men responsible for the movement that
launched the Committee on the Prevention of
Tuberculosis of the Charity Organization
Society of New York City. The aim of the
committee was to disseminate information
that TB was a communicable, preventable, and
curable disease. The Committee advanced the
movement for hospitals, sanatoriums, and
dispensaries for consumptive adults and children.
As a result of his focus on the need for a
national TB association, in 1904 a voluntary
health agency was organized under the National
Association for the Study and Prevention
of Tuberculosis, later renamed the National
Tuberculosis Association (NTA) and
now known as the American Lung Association.
To fund the activities of the many local affiliates,
the Association adopted a method that
was originated in Denmark in 1904 by Einor
Holboll, a Danish postal clerk, who sold
Christmas Seals. In 1907, many TB sanatoriums
had sprung up all
around the country; most
were small and makeshift.
One in Delaware
was in such urgent need
of funds that it was going
to have to close unless
$300 could be raised.
Dr. Joseph Wales, one of
the doctors working at
Emily Bissell
that sanatorium, contacted
his cousin, Emily
Bissell, to help raise the
money. Emily was a welfare worker in
Wilmington, Delaware; she was also active in
the American Red Cross and had fund-raising
experience. After reading an article about the
Christmas seals in Denmark, she created a
design, borrowed money from friends, and
had 50,000 Christmas seals printed. The seals