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As this opportunity of obtaining treatment in the immediate
neighbourhood becomes known the work will increase still more.
The percentage of children inspected (13,315) and who needed
treatment (9,448) was 70 per cent., which approximates very
closely to the figure for the whole of England and Wales, which is
69.5 per cent. Undoubtedly a great deal of dental trouble could
be avoided or minimised if only the children from the earliest age
could be fed on a different diet. No one to-day uses their teeth
for mastication in the way that nature intended ; almost every meal
consists of soft foods, which cling round the teeth, and are not
removed till the time when the teeth are cleaned, if they are cleaned
at all. If hard and fibrous foods were eaten they would have a selfcleaning
action on the teeth and all the tissues of the mouth would
benefit enormously. This lack of mastication is also an important
predisposing cause of irregularity of the teeth. This condition is
very common, and makes for dental inefficiency throughout life.
As soon as the full complement of first teeth has arrived the young
child should exercise the muscles of mastication in order that they
should become fully developed. This development of the muscles
assists the development of the bone of the jaws, and makes them
the size which nature intended—to accommodate the permanent
teeth when they arrive.
At one of the schools I inspected 50 boys and girls at an average
age of 11 years, and found that 58 per cent. had irregular teeth,
and 12 per cent. with very bad irregularity. This, in my opinion,
is a very high percentage, and a great deal of it could have beer
avoided by proper diet. The teeth of these children will decay
much quicker than normally, owing to the fact that it is almost
impossible to keep them perfectly clean by mastication. The
irregular teeth can be regulated by appliances, but it usually means
that sound teeth have to be extracted to make room for the
eruption of the other teeth in proper alignment. The dentist can