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1 he result of the examinations shows that the general condition of the children
has been maintained there being an improvement on the figures for 1931, sub-normal
nutrition being 25 per cent, as compared with 28 per cent last year and 26 per
cent in 1930 ; anaemia, 24 per cent, as compared with 26.5 per cent in 1931 and 20
per cent in 1930. Rickets, however, showed some increase, 33 per cent of all cases,
as compared with 27 per cent in 1931 and 22 per cent in 1930, in spite of a year
outstanding in the amount of sunshine. In addition to the 33 per cent of cases
showing signs regarded as definitely indicative of rickets, there were 18 per cent of
cases showing minor signs that under X-Ray might have revealed a condition of
pathological change likely under favourable conditions to proceed to spontaneous
healing, or with unsuitable diet and environment to resolve itself into more florid
rickets. The position in regard to rickets appears a difficult one. The incidence of
the disease (or more properly deficiency) once again shows itself more heavily among
the boys examined, 37 per cent, as against 29 per cent of the girls. The highest
point of the rickets' curve, mapped according to age, occurred at the age of 3, not
at the first examinations following infancy : but healing of the bony lesions appeared
also to synchronise with this period since at the age of 4 there was a 33.3 per cent
drop in the height of the curve.
I he figures for dental caries, allied to the problems of dietetic and rachitic
faults, namely, 8 per cent, 27 per cent and 46 per cent at the ages of 2 years, 3 years
and 4 years are, for practical purposes, the same as those of the preceding two years.
The figures shown give no indication of the comparative amount of caries present
at the given ages in the cases examined to date, but an attempt is now being made
to record the number of defective teeth observed in each case so that a truer