Medicine: Decline of Rats

Ten years ago every other ship which docked in New York Harbor carried rats. Now only one out of twelve ships entering all U. S. harbors carries rats. Because rats harbor fleas which transmit dreadful bubonic plague to human beings. Surgeon General Thomas Parran Jr., upon noting the success of rat elimination aboard ships, last week happily announced that the danger of plague ever again reaching the U. S. from abroad is "almost eliminated."

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