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5
At present, the Officers of Public Ilealth and the
Local Authorities go but very little beyond the removal
of Nuisances injurious to health, feeling their
way cautiously in matters appertaining to drainage,
water supply, gas, and improvement of dwellings.
Much has been done by Vaccination, the abatement of
over-crowding, and the checking of contagious disease
by cleansing and disinfection. But by and bye they
must go further; open spaces and building plots will
be better regulated by municipal law; recreation
grounds, gymnastics, and public baths for body culture,
must be instituted; but more temperance in adults, and
a better sense of maternal duty towards infants, will
alone bring about a diminution of infantile mortality,
and greater length of days for the living. Then shall
it no longer be said with truth, "that the people are
destroyed for lack of knowledge," and that there is no
one to help them.