The Contagious Diseases Act : a paper read by Francis Cadell, Esq, F.R.C.S.E., lecturer on syphilology, Edinburgh School of Medicine, before the Medico-Chirurgical Society of Edinburgh, January, 1881, on the hygienic and legislative failure of the acts, with the discussion of the Society.

  • Cadell, Francis.
Date:
[1881]
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The Contagious Diseases Act : a paper read by Francis Cadell, Esq, F.R.C.S.E., lecturer on syphilology, Edinburgh School of Medicine, before the Medico-Chirurgical Society of Edinburgh, January, 1881, on the hygienic and legislative failure of the acts, with the discussion of the Society. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    ARTICLE V. ON THE CONTAGIOUS DISEASES ACTS, BY FRANCIS CADELL, F.R.C.S.E., LECTURER ON SYPHILOLOGY, EDINBURGH SCHOOL OF MEDICINE. {Read before the Medico-C/iirurgical Society of Ediiil>aryh, Ut December, 1880.) too In examiaiag the results of the working of the Contagious Diseases Acts I shall not touch upon the moral aspect of the question, as that is beyond the sphere of a medical paper, and shall only refer to the social bearings of the subject Avhen these are directly connected with the increase or diminution of venereal disease. It is also not my intention to go deeply into statistics, as, from the ease with which figures may be manipulated, it would bring an element of confusion into the discussion; and because, as I shall afterwards sliow, those statistics give no information at all upon the effects of the Acts in preventing constitutional syphilis, the only matter of real importance connected with the subject. The motive of the Acts must be well known to every one, and consists in the compulsory and periodical examination of all registered prostitutes, and their detention in hospital when found diseased. I shall now proceed to consider what in the working of these Acts is baneful and what is beneficial—for I think there is good as well as bad in them,—aud afterwards draw my conclusions from the examination of both sides of the question. The first thing to consider is the effect of the Acts on the number of prostitutes and brothels in the subjected districts. In whatever country these or similar Acts are in iorce, we see as the invariable result a diminution in the number of public prostitutes and the houses they frequent. This appears to me, however, anything but an unmixed good. The repression of these women through the working of the Acts does not mean that prostitution has lessoned, or that the resulting disease has been reduced. It only means that the women who dislike the police regulations (and this dislike is almost universal) have either left the district or become clandestine prostitutes. Any one who has visited the large cities of the Continent, Paris,