SAMOAN EPIDEMIC

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 282, 25 August 1919, Page 6

SAMOAN EPIDEMIC

HEALTH DEPARTMENT'S PART 1 MINISTER DISCLAIMS RESPONSIBILITY The Minister of Public Health (Hon. G. W. Russell) stated on Saturday that the Health Department disclaimed all responsibility in connection with the epidemic of influenza at Samoa last year. Tho report of the Samoan Bpidemio Commission suggested that either the Health Department or the Defence Department had been guilty of negligence in not informing tho Samoan authorities of the fact that influenza had been made a notifiable • disease in New Zenland. _ ~, "I desire to stato that the" Health Department accepts no responsibility for the outbreak of influenza at Samoa, said Mr. Russell. "This Department lias never been in any way associated with Samoa. lam not aware of a single communication ever having been received by the Health Department in connection with the islands, or even "With Ravotonga and the Cook Islands. Sanioa ha 3 been a Defence responsibility throughout, and Cook Islands aro under a separate Minister. Neither, so far as I am aware, does the. Health Department accept responsibility as •to the health of passengers and crews on outgoing vessels. It would be impossible to do so. Tho Department's responsibility is to deal with incoming vessels. In the oase of the Talune, which carried the disease to the islands, 6ho had the disease on board, and was quaran. tir.ed at both Levuka. and Suva, but not at Samoa, by the Defence Health _ Office!; hence the disease. When 6ho left Auckland, influenza was not a notifiable disease."