OUR BABIES

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 16, 13 October 1917, Page 5

OUR BABIES

TBY HTGEU.I Published under the auspices of the Society for the Health of Women anil Children. "It i.i wiser to put up a fence at the . top of a precipice than to maintain an ambulance at Die bottom." SAVE-THE-BAIUES WEEK. Our foreign correspondent (Mr. William Jenkins) has sent nic the following article, which was published in the"i Sunday at Home," an English magazine, at the time of the National Baby Week recently hold in England. Although New Zealand in held up in this magazine as an example to the world so far as an Infantile JforlalMy is concerned, lvc have no excuse for reeting on our oars when I here is still so much fo bo done. -THE GREATEST WAR ECONOMY OP ALL." "It may be," says John Buskin, "digcovered that tho true veins of wealth are purple—and not in rock, but in flesh— perhaps even that the linal outcome and consummation of all wealth is in the producing of as many as possible fullbreathed, bright-eyed, and happy uuman creatures." In this country the younger the child the less assured is its mortal stride. Out of every 10CO boys who are born about 30 die within the first week of life, alro another 50 beforo three months are out, and yet 60 more by the end of the first year. Bat between the ages of one and two cily another oO drop out of the race, so that tho first week of life is as fatal as the whole of the second 12 months, hhould a boy reach the age of five, his chances of living ai. least, to 25 are 40 times crsattr tin i are the chances of the new-born babe becoming a one-year-old. When everything is taken into account, perhaps tho wonder should be, not that so many babies die, but that .so i/.any live. There must be some tremendous I vitality in every fresh instalment cT the I human stock which enables it to light as successfully as it does the spiteful foes of infancy. The death-rale among infants in P.ussia, according to a. Russian medical man, is similar to that of the soldiers on the battlefield. Every baby is enfiladed from entrenchments laid deeply in ils own environment, in its inherited constitution, and in the ignorance of its parents. Its very feeding bottle (of course, no [ceding bottle should be needed) may prove a traitor, the flannels that swathe it may work it mischief, and the mother's hand that rocks tho cradle may sign its death warrant. Instruction in Mothercraft Essential. The disorder which carries off tho greatest number of infants is not diarrhoea or pneumonia, but parental ignorance. This is not the. same thing as parental indifference. A larger number of little lives arc, shortened by too much comforting and cuddling than by deliberate neglect. The number of children who die by starvation iB not to bo compared with the number of those who die of overfeeding or improper feeding, due as often as not to the foolish indulgence of the mother. What is wanted is molheroraft—a word not to be found in tho dictionary, but one which is fairly self-explanatory. The solution of tho problem of infant mortality ia 80 per cent, the care and training of the mother. It is strango indeed that wc should have been so slow to learn the art which Mother live introduced into human society. Tho very creatitres of Held and forest shame us. The main reproach should not be levelled against cither tho mothers or the fathers, but rather against the community and the State. The quickening of public conscience on this matter has been woefully tardy. '. No Jtecognition of Babies' Rignts hi the Victorian Era. At the end of the nineteenth century tho rate of infant mortality had fallen very little, if at all. below that which prevailed in tho thirties, when civil registration began. Tbe long reign of the Mother Queen was a time of reform and scientific development and great productive capacity. The franchise was extended, political economy was studied as it hud never been studied before, and men began to conjure up Imperial visions. But one searches in vain, even for the note of regret, let, alone the call to action, at, the annual Herodian massacre.' The number of infants who died ill the United Kingdom in 1900 was 170,000, and "flic rate was almost as high as it had ever been during the Victorian era.

The modern movement towards the conservation of infant life stands for a new social consciousness.

EXAMPLE OP NEW SiEAIiANI). For I lie most, startling instance or results wo may bo to the other side of tho world. Ten years . ago tbo'. infant- mortality rain or New Zealand' was remarkably low compared with that of England, but in the interval il has been actually brought down to only 5 per cent., mainly as the result of the activities of a society for the health of women and children. To-day the infant mortality rain of New Zealand is little more than halt that of Bath or Eastbourne, our most favoured towns. Tho work already accomplished ly; infant welfare centres dopeudent upoii local public spirit and initiative has proved un to the hilt that at least, half our English infant mortality is preventable. To safeguard infant life is more important than to keel) up the Bold reserve in the Bank of England. All the facts go t-o show that a low infant mortality always co-exists with a high'standard of general health and fitness. If no steps are taken to reduce, infant mortality we not merely eliminnto the weaklings, but enfeeble those who survive. The same causes that kill 10 or 12 babies out of every hundred leave a more or less permanent mark on almost the whole of the babies who manage to keep this side of the dead line. Modern Infanticide not Voluntary, but Long Drawn Out and Infinitely More Cruel. ~. . Even were it otherwise, a policy of laissez faire would be unsuppurtii-blc to the Christian conscience.

A public spirit enlightened by Clhristiunity is the only thing that opposes infanticide. Tito greatest civilisation the world Juts over seen, the Greek and Soman, sanctioned infanticide, equally with the Bushmen of Africa iiud the unicgcnerate h'outh Sea Islanders. All the nonOhristiau religions, with the notable exception of the Jewish, have countenanced it. Mohammedanism sanctions it. Only British rule, in India has checked it among the Hindus and the Brabmuns. 11 is one of the commonest practices in China; it has a considerable footing iu Japan. And, let it be remembered for our own profit there is no clear line, of division between the deliberate slaying of infants and passive acquiescence iu the local evils which make a hngo infant mortality possible. The exigencies of race, preservation arc now coming to reinforce the Christian position. We are all beginning to see that it is a condition of Zion that, as the ancient prophet said, "the city shall be full-of boys and girls playing in the streets thereof."

Wo arc getting a new vision of Motherhood as being not only an individual but a communal interest. The children in tho street are our children. Someone, lias said with regard to another great reform that tho only way to get it accomplished is to Yellow-journalise it—to pick out its salient points and scream about them. If tho infant death-rate for the United Kingdom were as low as it is in New Zealand, the number of babies thus saved within four years would equal the runnier of a million lives which it is estimated we will lose in the present war. The saving of tho infants would mean preventing a terrible waste of every hind, not least the unavailing travail of a world of mothers. And by our methods of instruction and reforming conditions we shall be making straighter paths for all the ten million pairs, of tiny feet that will come tripping along in any cose be. fore the next ten years are out.