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14
I am not at present going. into the complex question of
heredity, but the one simple fact has only to be stated to be
recognised that the healthier the conditions under which the
parents live the greater are the chances of their offspring
attaining healthy adolescence.
Analysis into the causes of Infant Mortality for Merton
shows that out of the 17 deatns, 8, or nearly half, were due to
congenital defeats and debility. Of these, 5 were born in
such a condition that life was not possible owing to congenital
defects in vital organs, and the other 3 described as deaths
from debility and marasmus, had not sufficient vitality to
live. The causes of this debility and marasmus, conditions
where either a full term baby, healthy in appearance and weight,
dwindles away, or a child, puny at the very beginning, dies
without obvious cause, are not fully understood, but investigation
into the medical histories of the parents (which, however,
in any large scale is not practicable at present) may possibly
supply some clue to this source of wastage of infant life.
Marasmus may, however, in some instances, mean a specific congenita!
disease.
Of the other causes of death, diarrhceal diseases were accountable
for four. Diarrhceal diseases vary in their significance
according to the causes from which they arrise. The form
which prevails when the ground temperature is high, proves
fatal in a large number of instances, and it is because of a
happier termination in cases due to other causes, that the gravity
of Summer Diarrhœa is not sufficiently recognised.
The past summer was cool and wet, and these meteorological
conditions were probably inimical to the growth of the
germs suspected of causing the disease. Flies are the possible
carriers of the germ from the soil, where tlhey probably grow to
food, which is one of the important vehicles of infection.