PLAGUE KILLS 650,000.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1185, 21 July 1911, Page 5

PLAGUE KILLS 650,000.

HALF-YEAR-IS DEATH-ROLL IN INDIA. By Tdesraph-Prpss Association-Copyrieht London, July 10. Mr. E. S. Montagu,.Under-Secretary for India, stated in the Houso of Commons that there had been 650,690 deaths from plaguo in India during the last half-year of which 21,453 were recorded in June. DYING BY MILLIONS. The. preciso effect upon India of the present pandemic of bubonic plague (savs the specal correspondent of "The Times") has never been properly considered or estimated. One reason is that tho plague has been overshadowed and obscured bv other great natural calamities which have occurred in India sinco the pandemic began, the existence of plaguo in Bombay was first officially noted on September 23, 1890. In 189G-7 India endured a visitation of famine which caused a mortality estimated at 750,000 in British territory alone. This was followed by tho greater famine of 1890-1900, in which over 1,000,000 people- perished in British districts, in addition to large numbers in native States. By the side of these vast misfortunes tho mortality from plaguo looked at tho time comparatively small. Another reason is that plaguo has become such a commonplace matter in India that its graver consequences are apt to be desregarded. In many parts of the country it is now an incident of dailv life. Tho people outwardly seem indifferent concerning it, though they arc really anything but indifferent, as is seen at moments when the death-rato grows hign. To many of the greater officials, though not to the men in "tho districts," it has grown to bo merely a part of tho ordinary routine of administration. Its larger aspects aro lost sight of, or dismissed without much consideration in tho hopo that another year may bring relief. After reviovrinir the figures in detail, the writer says:-"We arrive then, at. tho yery grave inference that in India in tho last 14 years a multitude equivalent to the whole population of Greater London has perished from one epidemic disease, and that this mortality for the most part represents an excess above the normal deaths. The bulk of the mortality has been confined to three provinces. In the Punjab, in the year 1907 alone, 608,08") persons were registered as having died of plague. Such an appalling visitation must have exercised a profound effect upon the people of tho province, yet Gevernment publications may be «oa'rchcd in vain for any satisfactory evidence of its consequences."

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