OUR BABIES

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 39, 9 November 1918, Page 3

OUR BABIES

I'B* HTGSU.I Published under the auspicea of the Boyai i'lew Zealand Society for tho Health of Women and Children. "It ia wiser to put up a ieuce at the top of a precipice than to maintain an ambulance at the bottom." SHOKINQ TO HABITS. Wo women are the conservatives of the world, and nothing gratifies us more than when anyone with a spark of authority (or without any, for that matter) comes forward to assure us that we may continue with comparative impunity somo fashion or custom which we have long been secretly convinced is doing harm to ..ourselves and our familiee. Thus every now and then someone makes a specious apology for corsets, pointed shoes, or high heele, and we turn at once, ivith a Bigh of relief, to the latest champion of our frailties. "Emancipated" though we are, it is curious that even in matters of dress we' should still tend to turn to mon for justification when quite Bure that we are doing wrong! The fact is that men are more bent on pleasing us than we are bent ,pn pleasing one another. A sensible woman is less tolerant.of the foibles of hor-fellow-women than is the average man. OUR. GUIDES. Whatever the explanation, we certainly ( do tend to look to men for guidance in the art of living,, but it is much harder for mothers to accept and adopt healthful innovations than it is for men to nropound them and demonstrate their necessity. Granted that this is so, how much, are our doubte and difficulties increased when men are not of one mind themselves as to the proper course to purßue! The above reflections were forced on me by reading what the most advanced thinkore of tho day in the medicnl and dental professions have been Baying for nearly twenty years concerning foods and feeding, and contrasting their conclusions (which seem to admit of no doubt whatever) with what I find recommended in popular health manuals which are being issued from the Press in London to-day under the auspices of leading public hoalth authorities. RADICAL CHANGE NEEDED IN FEEDING OP OHILDEEN. To anyone who will fairly look into the question of the rearing of our childron there is no room for e. shadow of doubt that feeding habits must bo radically changed, unless we are prepared to coiltinuo sacrificing tho race by letting tho mouth. and jaws remain relatively idle from the cradle onwards. Wo know that thie is tho essential cause of bad teeth and indigestion universally prevalent under the conditions of modern civilisation; it is obvious that if tho children- are to be savod from this curse they mußt bo trained to eat properly, and must be civen a sufiloioncy of hard, dry, and tough foods in the placo of milk and mush. In proportion to its size, the normal child at two years of ago should be equipped with as powerful jaws and as serviceable a set of teeth as it will have at any'later period of life. Further, the continued development of tho jaws and the quality of the Becond teeth depend almost entirely on full uso being made of the first set. ■ • In the light of somo current teachings wo can fully sympathise with the despairing protests of men such as Dr. Sim Wallace (the JesdinK dental authority of. the day in this connection), whose address at tho Birmingham Dental Congress wo continue from last week: . DIETETIC REFORM. "Enough has been said to indicate cither that we dentists know nothing about the hygiene of tho mouth or that tho medical profession knows nothing or caroe nothing about it. Simple methode of dental hygiene, such as the toothbrush and mouthwashes, seem now to be quito inadequate to prevent the ruinous results of a dietetic system such as is being forced upon tho children of the present generation with the most dogmatic assurance. Hardly has a child cut its temporary teeth before it is restricted to fcoft fermentable foods, which stultify tho natural self-cleansing processes of the mouth. Younrr children aro almost entirely limited to milk, bread soaked in milk, milk puddinqs and norrid(*e, all fermentable foods ivhich nre nondetergent in their effects, and by tho time these children have their temtiorary dentition comnlete the teeth are so tender froii belt" of use. they, naturally refuße to nibble even a crust. What can we do? We are dentists, and as it Is sunnosed that the dietetic recime ehould be left to tho medical profession, it doee not seem likely that we Bliall bo able to do much without the co-oneration of medical mon. And when we have tho great authorities paying all their attention to the nutritive valne of the fcod it is difficult to ncrsuado anyone that lnck of oral hyrien.o accounts fiM , far mor» trnnliln amon- childron tlnn lack of nourishment. The difßcnlty whioh parents sometimes find in getting their children to take ennueh food results in moat cases from the insanitary condition of the mouth arid, alimentary rnnal, and it cannot astonish us that children refuse tho nourishment which has brought ?liniit tHi« Insanitary s'nte. Then what onn be done? We seem all to be completely dammed by the Imaginary l>nniid*"i"« of oif «'*n Bticclaltws. Hut Httlo lercolatea and that, very slowly from one sneHnlty to another."—Address at Dental Congress, Ninninphnm. 1909. by J. Sin , Wallace, M.D., D.Sc, L.D.S.

THE PIONEEI/3. It is gratifying to know that in his crusade figninEt prevailing fandiu* , vices of M<.•> rfiv IV Sin , . \\ T nlhi>p line <hn nnvrn-vnr-iner support and approval of Dr. Harry Campbell, whora sncclnl authority as ft l>hys niiin In thiu connection !* universally remised. TiirWii TV pninilmll "-.-is thn pioneer. His emphatic denunciations of the curse of "nap-fcodiny" date buck somv 30 ynjrs.- Wo are hopeful that in this moftn-,- '1,., rii't.-o.tnq of mifin nnrt common sense will have won their way into many lioinee in the course of the ncxi dccnd" the iiynnur". time needed for tho (reneral adoption of simnlo reforms of this class, is f™-> .- njififin Vir.tr n century. I'nlio , !- al feeding of children is just beginning to emerge in some quarters from thh etaue of botnc called "a mere fad." Tine is a hopeful sign! Ten years hence iconic will bepin to wonder "how anyone could ever hai-o Leon eo etup.'d as to thinlt otherwise."