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While during the last thirty years the population of England and
Wales has increased by J 0,000,000, the gross mortality is less now
than it was then ; and public health policy has not only neutralised
the.increase in the death-rate, which, through increasing urbanisation,
would otherwise certainly have occurred, but it has secured a considerable
balance on the right side.
But the fact that, whereas during the past fifty years the general
death-rate has fallen some 26 per cent. and some millions of lives have
been saved, the infant population has not shared in this reduction even
to the extent of 1 per cent., is a serious matter for reflection ; and
when it is considered in conjunction with the circumstance that the
birth-rate has declined over 17 per cent, during the same period (a
decline which during recent years has been at a greater rate than that
of any other European country), it becomes a matter for grave national
concern. If the fall in the birth-rate of our nation is to continue, as
there is little doubt that it will do, it is essential for our national
vitality to curtail the heavy expenditure of infant life.
Among infants in both urban and rural counties there has been
a marked increase in the deaths from gastro-intestinal maladies and