Dowling Talks On Influenza Masks

• Dr. Dowling wrote a letter to the editor of the New Orleans States. Took objection to statements made in a recent editorial in NOS entitled “The Flu Mask.”• Dr. Dowling: says that the State Board of Health recommended the use of the flu mask in sickrooms and that “it might have been wise to have enforced a rule that the public should wear them.”• In Dowling’s letter to NOS: “Your editorial of Tuesday “The Flu Mask” which implies use of these to have been a useless imposition on the community to my mind does the health departments an injustice.”• In Dowling’s letter to NOS: “With reference to the mask regulation, this office was not consulted. We understood unofficially Captain Brigham had notified drug stores and managers of restaurants, etc., that employees must wear the mask or the soldiers would not be permtited [sic] to enter their places. The order, no doubt, was issued in good faith. In San Francisco the newspapers report a regulation that all civilians should wear the mask.”• Dr. Dowling: “If it had been thought in the beginning of the epidemic their use would have accomplished the desired end, we would have gone on record to this effect. We fully appreciate the efforts of the Red Cross and the untiring work of the noble women who made and furnished the masks.”• Dr. Dowling: “That our restrictions were far from being sufficiently drastic in this emergency was my judgment in the beginning. I am still of the same opinion. When we fight fire we want all the water possible; when we fight disease nothing should be left undone. Lack of co-operation is responsible in this epidemic for the loss of many lives. The State Board of Health, through me as its executive officer, desires to be in hearty sympathy with any move which has or may tend to decrease the disease, and further, disclaims any responsibility for the order requiring the ‘flu’ masks.”Newspaper article