A GRAVE PROBLEM

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 6, Issue 52, 2 March 1943, Page 4

A GRAVE PROBLEM

COMMENTING on the fact that 271 new cases of tuberculosis had been notified in the Dominion this year, with 83 deaths, the medical officer of health at Wellington, Dr. Hubert Smith, says that while the position does not give cause for alarm, it definitely shows the need for steady and continuous work to reduce what he describes as "this really grave problem." These figures, he added, were about the same as the Health Department had been recording since the notification of all forms of the disease was instituted about 18 months ago, and there did not appear to be any relative increase m the incidence of the disease. The danger of tuberculosis is that its advance, like cancer, is subtle, but, unlike cancer, is communicable to others. This aspect of it points to the importance in the public interest of early diagnosis and due precautions to prevent the spread of the disease. The: method of X-ray examination now in use enables this to be ensured to a much greater degree than was possible formerly. Periodical examinations, considered to be so valuable in the war against cancer in its early stages, should therefore be held no less important as a safeguard against the inroads of tuberculosis.