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SANITARY CONVENTION (INTER-AMERICAN)—OCTOBER 14, 1905
453

SECTION II. CONDITIONS SHOWING A GIVEN TERRITORIAL AREA TO BE INFECTED, OR TO HAVE BEEN FREED FROM INFECTION

Article VII. Information of a first case of plague, cholera or yellow fever does not justify against a territorial area where it may appear, the application of the measures prescribed in Chapter II as hereinafter indicated.

Upon the occurrence of several non-imported cases of plague, or a non-imported case of yellow fever or when cases of cholera form a focus, the area is to be declared infected.

Article VIII. To limit the measures to the affected regions alone, governments should only apply them to persons and articles proceeding from the contaminated or infected areas.

By the word "area" is understood a well determined portion of territory described in the information which accompanies or follows notification, thus, a province, a state, "a government," a district, a department, a canton, an island, a commune, a city, a quarter of a city, a village, a port, a "polder," a hamlet, etc., whatever may be the extent and population of these portions of territory.

But this restriction, limited to the infected area, should only be accepted upon the formal condition that the government of the infected country shall take the necessary measures; 1, to prevent, unless previously disinfected, the exportation of articles named in 1 and 2 of Article XII, coming from the contaminated area; and 2, measures to prevent the extension of the epidemic; and provided further that there be no doubt that the sanitary authorities of the infected country have faithfully complied with Article I of this Convention.

When an area is infected, no restrictive measure is to be taken against departures from this area if these departures have occurred five days, at least, before the beginning of the epidemic.

Article IX. That an area should no longer be considered as infected, official proof must be furnished:

First, That there has been neither a death nor a new case of plague or cholera for five days after isolation,[1] death, or cure of the last plague or cholera case. In the case of yellow fever the period shall be eighteen days, but each government may reserve the right to extend this period.


  1. The word "isolation" signifies isolation of the patient, of the persons who care for him and the forbidding of visits of all other persons, the physician excepted. By isolation in the case of yellow fever is understood the isolation of the patient in an apartment so screened as to prevent the access of mosquitoes. [Footnote in original.]