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24
INFANT MORTALITY.
Infant Mortality has reference to the deaths of children
under one year of age, i.e., the proportion which the deaths
of such infants in any given year bears to every thousand
children born in the same year. The infant mortality varies
widely in different districts, being as low as 80 per 1,000 in
some localities, and as high as 250 per 1,000 in others. The
infant mortality of a district has come to be recognised as a
sensitive index of the sanitary condition of that district, as at
this period of its life the infant is very susceptible to its
environment, a low rate indicating, other things being equal,
a healthy community, a high rate the reverse.
Of recent years the subject of infant mortality has assumed
great importance, and sanitarians have given great attention
to the problem. This is not to be wondered at, when it is
remembered that, notwithstanding the great advance that has
taken place during the last twenty or thirty years in sanitation,
as shown by the decline that has taken place in the general
death-rate of the nation, and in the incidence and mortality from
most forms of infectious disease, such has not been the case
as regards infant mortality, which has either actually increased
or at least remained stationary.
Furthermore, the situation is becoming serious, having
regard to the steady and progressive decline which is taking
place in the birth-rate all over the country. This state of things
must, in course of time, end in a serious decline in the population
of the country. Each year, in England and Wales, there is
a loss of 120,000 lives of infants under one year of
age. During 1907 this loss was 108,214. The causes
which give rise to this "Slaughter of the Innocents"
are further inimical to the survivors, many of whom
survive for a few months, while others grow up to
adult life, to swell the ranks of the physically degenerate
and recruit the army of the unemployable. The importance of
the question, therefore, cannot be overestimated, and it has, in