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61
[1911
In 1907 he presented a detailed report on the Prevention of Infantile Mortality
(a subject about which he first wrote more than thirty years ago, as well as
on many occasions since), and to that report he would direct the attention of
the Council. The facts contained in it remain uncontroverted because they are
incontrovertible. Several of them have been quoted again and again by persons
who are considering this great question,, and they have been referred to in
the report of the Royal Commission on the Poor Laws. The document,
however, remains a dead letter on the book-shelf in Islington, which some day,
when the writer may have gone hence, may be adduced as a proof of the want
of the due appreciation by the Council of that day of what was passing around
them, and of their declining to use the mental glasses to which Mr. Schooling
alludes. Let us look for a moment at some of the chief causes of this
mortality among infants:—
Measles destroys on an average 32 per annum, in 1911 28
Diphtheria „ 52 „ „ 31
Diarrhœal diseases „ 126 „ „ 227
Premature birth „ 167 „ „ 149
Atrophy and Marasmus „ 180 „ ,, 115
Tuberculous diseases „ 66 „ „ 40
Bronchitis „ 91 „ „ 51
Pneumonia ,, 111 „ „ 100
Convulsions „ 42 „ „ 117
Suffocation „ 64 „ „ 92
All these deaths are more or less preventable, even those due to premature
birth. And yet when this subject was discussed some years ago, much laughter
was created by a Councillor who commented on the inclusion by the Medical
Officer of Health of the deaths due to this cause—and, indeed, it was described
as nonsense. But what is the fact? There is hardly a death from any
cause so assuredly preventable, because frequently it only requires that the mother
should be reached while in a pregnant state, particularly if she has been prematurely
confined on a previous occasion, and advised as to what she should do, so as
to bring her offspring into the world, fully developed, strong, and healthy. And
the chief advice is to refrain from work, and to rest, or to cure some abnormal
habit of body. Many infants would be saved if the mothers were reached
in time; and it is for this, among other reasons, that institutions have been
established where expectant mothers are afforded an opportunity of consulting
proper advisers as to what they should do so as to bear healthy progeny. We
have no such institution in Islington. Would that we had !