afterglow

Chapter 698 Chapter Eating and curing illness: two major issues; the cusp of the storm
South of the West Garden by the Mochou Lake are two rows of small courtyards, which were used by some court officials to recuperate. Today, a biologist and an organic chemist from Baiyunshan Medical College traveled all the way from Guangzhou to Beijing to seek support from their team.

“…It is effective against a variety of pathogens, especially Gram-negative bacteria. Experiments against Salmonella typhi and Bordetella pertussis were completely successful.”

"This is a great thing. You don't need to worry about the funding. Just submit the application."

"Thank you so much. This is a matter that concerns the people's livelihood. We will do our best to perfect our research and seize every opportunity!"

After the war, Zhou Changfeng gradually shifted the focus of his work. After all, the pressure on national defense was relatively small, and it was enough to let nature take its course after determining the basic policies and general direction.

Military and politics are ultimately driven by economic factors. The pursuit of profit is usually the basic motive for war, and the people's vision is often to live a good life in this way.

It is obvious that the Ming Dynasty's bureaucratic capitalist system and the extremely uneven development gap led to rather mediocre living conditions, especially in economically less developed regions such as Yunnan, Guizhou, Shaanxi and Gansu.

Historically, the welfare systems of various countries were mostly established during the Cold War, and before that they were not worth mentioning. The Ming Dynasty had special national conditions, and there had always been relief policies established by the government, but generally speaking, they were the same.

What are the two most basic needs?
The first is the problem of food, and the second is the problem of medical treatment.

The former can be further divided into basic carbohydrates - rice and wheat, and higher-level proteins - meat, eggs and milk.

Last autumn, Zhou Changfeng personally traveled to Nurgan, Henan, Hubei, Lingnan, and Anxi, and spent more than a month conducting a brief investigation of the grain planting and animal husbandry conditions.

At present, there are still some areas in the Ming Dynasty - provinces that are neither economically developed nor grain-producing areas are hovering at the level of subsistence and urgently need improvement; most provinces have sufficient food, but the intake of meat, eggs and milk is still too low.

Considering that the Heilongjiang region has not been fully cultivated and still has considerable room for development, and the local mechanized farming level can also be improved, Zhou Changfeng believes that this is an opportunity to make use of retired tanks, so he persuaded the Ministry of War to approve this instruction.

Until the end of the war, there were still more than 2,000 Type 37 light tanks and Type 40 medium tanks piled up, stranded, and laid up in factory warehouses and port docks.

Some of these tanks that rolled off the production line have been stranded for several months, and even their paint has peeled and they have rusted. They have failed to play their due role and have become surplus materials overnight.

When the Ming army's armored units fought overseas, they would only bring back trucks first, and tanks were secondary. Tanks with more motor hours and faults were abandoned, and the machine guns were dismantled and the breech blocks were destroyed. After returning home, these units would receive the brand new tanks stranded in the mainland, and some units were disbanded not long after.

Finally, about a thousand stockpile tanks had their turrets and weapons removed and were simply converted into heavy agricultural machinery. They were then transferred to the local government in Nurgan at a low price and suddenly began to shine on the vast black soil.

In addition, more than 400 primary trainer aircraft were also modified with pesticide spraying devices and transferred at low prices to places in need for use as agricultural aircraft.

Not only that, Zhou Changfeng also decided to massively expand the production of 666 pesticide (hexachlorocyclohexane) to popularize basic insecticides, referring to the opinions of several military governors and officials from the Ministry of Revenue.

666 is an organochlorine insecticide with good effects. More importantly, its manufacturing process is simple and does not require high temperature and high pressure reaction restrictions, which is very conducive to production expansion. However, 666 is highly toxic and stable and difficult to decompose. Large-scale use will pollute the environment.

Historically, 666 has been widely used and has played an important role in eliminating locust plagues and controlling pests, thereby increasing the yield of grain crops in disguise.

Since the 1930s, all major prefectures in the Ming Dynasty have begun to produce 666. Zhou Changfeng is now determined to expand production to the maximum extent, using it as a transitional pesticide for the next decade or so, and then replacing it with other pesticides in the future.

How can we talk about health and hygiene if we can’t even get enough to eat?

As for higher-level proteins, this is much more difficult.

The Ming Dynasty court and local government introduced Yorkshire pigs to improve the local black pigs and promoted them vigorously. The time it takes to market a white pig is almost half that of a black pig, which roughly doubles the meat production.

But this was far from enough, so Zhou Changfeng changed his mind and decided to introduce turkeys as a supplement.

Turkey meat has a bad taste, being woody and fishy, ​​but it also has its own unique advantages.

Meat turkeys can be slaughtered after being raised for 4 to 5 months, and the feed-to-meat ratio can reach 2.4:1. Even with extensive breeding, the feed-to-meat ratio can reach 3:1, which is higher than that of ordinary poultry. Such a rapid growth momentum is unattainable for poultry.

Turkey has a high lean meat rate and is rich in protein. Although it tastes worse, it is still an excellent source of protein.

【Picture】

At his urging, the imperial court sent a team of agronomists and zoologists to the United States and Mexico to evaluate various breeds of turkeys and find turkey breeds suitable for free-range breeding in rural areas of the Ming Dynasty and centralized breeding in chicken farms.

This is only a short-term plan. From a long-term perspective, Australia should build itself into a supplier of large quantities of meat, eggs and milk, leveraging its advantages of good grazing conditions in addition to its rich mineral resources.

A strong body is the foundation of everything, especially for young people. Doing everything possible to lower the prices of meat, eggs and milk is a very important key to people's livelihood.

When it comes to illness and treatment, this is also a major issue that cannot be ignored.

In this age when the medical system is incomplete and even antibiotics are not widely available, the harm caused by various diseases is extremely terrible, and any one of them is almost incurable.

Take tuberculosis, one of the infectious diseases, as an example. Tens of thousands of patients die from tuberculosis every year.

This disease is rampant all over the world. Penicillin can treat tuberculosis, but the effect is not obvious. In the later era when various antibiotics are available, penicillin is not the first choice of medicine.

In Ming territory alone, 86.5 and 85.8 people died of tuberculosis in 710 and 720 respectively - the number of Ming soldiers killed in the five years of war was less than half of the annual deaths from tuberculosis. The Ministry of Revenue's Health and Protection Department estimated that the total number of infected people was about to million.

Moreover, the economic development of a province greatly widens the gap in mortality rates.

在以京师应天府和上海府为代表的发达州府，肺结核死亡比例仅0.06%（62人/10万全人口）；在以兰州和贵阳为代表的经济落后州府，肺结核死亡比例却高达0.23%（235人/10万全人口）。

【Picture】

If this is the case in the state capital, the situation will only be worse in the vast rural areas where there is a shortage of medical care.

Improving health conditions requires a three-pronged approach - first, raising awareness of health issues; second, making medicines more widely available; and third, increasing medical resources.

Penicillin has the limitation of poor inhibitory effect on Gram-negative bacteria, so it is necessary to enrich the types of antibiotics. Zhou Changfeng is very concerned about this, which is one of the reasons why the strain selection and cultivation team of Baiyunshan Medical College made a special trip to Beijing.

Previously, American microbiologists discovered streptomycin, an antibiotic that was very effective against tuberculosis, in the soil. This triggered a crazy treasure hunt, and many pharmaceutical companies sent people to collect soil samples from all over the world.

Last year, Baiyunshan Medical College discovered a new mold, chloramphenicol, from thousands of soil samples, and then began to conduct in-depth research. Chloramphenicol is a broad-spectrum antibiotic that is effective against Gram-negative bacteria that penicillin is ineffective against, and is effective against Salmonella typhi and Bordetella pertussis.

Today's epidemics are not limited to tuberculosis. Typhoid and whooping cough are also major scourges, killing tens of thousands of people every year.

People have found that chloramphenicol is stable in nature. Its physiological saline solution will not become ineffective even if boiled at high temperature for several hours. It can also maintain its antibacterial activity if stored dry in a sealed container for several years.

More importantly, chloramphenicol has a simple chemical structure and can be easily produced on a large scale through artificial chemical synthesis.

But it also has dangerous toxic side effects. Its serious complications can cause bone marrow hematopoietic dysfunction and induce anemia.

But the merits outweigh the flaws. Such an easy-to-manufacture, powerful, and shelf-stable broad-spectrum antibiotic can now be called a dream panacea.

Therefore, not only Zhou Changfeng, but also Zhu Lingjing attached great importance to this major discovery of chloramphenicol and issued a special order to urge follow-up clinical trials.

She said casually, "He's dying of illness, and you're talking to him about the side effects of the poison?"

A panacea is one thing, increasing medical resources is another.

Zhou Changfeng's personal opinion is that the situation faced by the Ming Dynasty is quite similar to that of the original plane, and some policies can be referred to according to local conditions.

Medical resources are concentrated in the state capitals, but are extremely scarce in rural areas. It is common to have only simple small clinics within a radius of dozens of miles. Almost no doctors who graduated from regular medical schools are willing to lower their status and go to the poor countryside, because they have no equipment and no salary.

Fortunately, the Ming Dynasty possessed sufficient financial resources that it did not have in the history of the original plane, and the imperial court was not short of money at all, which was a huge advantage.

After consulting the Ministry of Households, Zhou Changfeng put forward many suggestions.

① Prepare concise basic medical guidelines, divided into rural and urban versions.

② Recruit young men and women with a medium level of education to undergo a six-month intensive medical training.

③ Existing itinerant doctors are required to participate in standardized assessment and training.

④ Double remuneration and allowances were paid based on the local average salary, and the court would fully reimburse them because the local governments in these provinces had no money themselves.

⑤ Set up a large number of mobile hospitals to travel between rural areas and provide more professional and comprehensive medical services.

Because the Ming Dynasty had good objective conditions, Zhou Changfeng conceived a mobile hospital based on local conditions.

Each mobile hospital consists of four trucks - a living vehicle, which carries personal items for doctors and nurses; a pharmacy vehicle, which carries various medicines; a treatment vehicle, which carries generators and various medical equipment; and a surgical vehicle, which carries equipment for opening a temporary operating room.

There should be at least one mobile hospital in every county of inland provinces, which should roam around and stop in every township to provide medical treatment.

This series of measures are just transitional and temporary measures.

The Pacific War made the Ming Dynasty, which had great potential, earn a lot of money. It was only a matter of time before the economy took off.
In the current 65 years, the average life expectancy in Britain and the United States is 57 years old, while in the Ming Dynasty it is only 65 years old. Zhou Changfeng estimates that with this multi-pronged approach, it will be no problem to raise it to years within five years.

When rewarding people for their merits at the turn of autumn and winter last year, Zhu Lingjing fulfilled her promise and generously gave him a dukedom, using the title of Shen, a vassal state of the Jiang clan in the Spring and Autumn Period.

Compared with other dignitaries who were happy to participate in the feast of division, Zhou's behavior after the war was definitely a rare gem.

However, this is actually interference in civil affairs and is completely divorced from military issues.

As a senior general, he should have handed over his command and retired before entering politics, but Zhou Changfeng was naturally unwilling to give up, which caused dissatisfaction among many people.

Soon, signs of criticism emerged.

The fact that the German side used the atomic bomb in actual combat surprised everyone in the Ming Dynasty. As the secrecy of the Golden Crow Project was gradually lowered, more and more people learned the whole story, and suspicion of spies spread rapidly.

The Advisory Council held a hearing and summoned some of the responsible persons at the time to come for questioning. More than a dozen people were dismissed and detained.

At the same time, everyone inevitably noticed the important role Zhou played in this, so some people began to question why Zhou did not strengthen the screening work at the time and screen out unreliable scientific researchers.

Zhou Changfeng was too lazy to answer such meaningless questions. He only attended one hearing and never went again, and the Advisory Council could not force him to do so.

This incident pushed him to the forefront of public opinion, and the fact that he had gone to Spain on the pretext of illness without authorization was also dug up, and for a time he became the focus of public opinion among the government and the public.

In fact, Zhu Lingjing was also very unhappy with his reluctance to give up command and his interference in civil affairs, but out of basic friendship, she decided to transfer him to the Australian Governor-General's local military and political affairs to avoid the limelight.

Zhou Changfeng had been feeling uncomfortable with the doubts from all sides recently, so the emperor's arrangement was a good idea, especially since she had agreed to take her wife and children with her to take up the post.

"It's really troublesome to stay in the center of the storm like this, sir. Australia is a good place to go right now." Xia Xiaoshi said easily.

Zhou Changfeng groaned thoughtfully, looking at the blue sky and white clouds in autumn, and said, "That's fine. The emperor is far away and no one cares."

"Hey, saying this suddenly makes me feel a bit like being exiled to Qiongya in ancient times."

"It's completely different. Australia's conditions are not bad. The future development of our country will largely depend on it."

Given Australia's important strategic position, Zhou Changfeng can be said to be full of confidence and is vigorously developing this rich continent to feed back to the local area with a steady supply of mineral resources and animal husbandry.

The Governor-General is in charge of Australia's military and political affairs. This person has enormous power and is in charge of a certain area, which is almost equivalent to being a local emperor in Australia.

Zhou Changfeng still did not attend the fourth hearing. Fed up with all the trouble, he and his wife and children took a special train to Guangzhou and boarded the Donghu seaplane carrier to Australia.

Plane? Whoever is brave enough can take it.

(End of this chapter)