HEALTH STAMPS.

Evening Star, Issue 22146, 28 September 1935, Page 16

HEALTH STAMPS.

Plans are in. active preparation for the health stamp campaign which is to he prosecuted this year. It is under the patronage of the Governor-Gen-eral, who gives it his warm support, and it will be conducted by Mr L. 0. Hooker, honorary organiser, in conjunction with the Health and Post and Telegraph Departments. The campaign will begin on Monday next, when stamps will be available in all the post offices of the Dominion. Launched in 1931, progress is reported in this admirable movement, the sums received having risen from £634 to £Bl4. This is testimony that the value of the work is being recognised, but the financial resources of the promoters are quite inadequate to meet the plans that it is desirfed to carry out. In a letter to Mr Hooker, Sir James Young gives his cordial support to ,the schem-. As Minister of Health over a considerable period he is 1 fully aware of the advantages to be gained from these health camps, which are intended for children selected on the advice of officers of the school medical service or on the recommendation of medical practitioners. The camps are the means of providing a holiday in healthy and beneficial surroundings for children to whom such a holiday would otherwise be denied. The results of the establishment of the camps, though limited because of financial considerations, have been so encouraging that it has been decided not only to continue them, but to enlarge extend them. With this end in view an effort is to be made to collect £IO,OOO, This should be quite practicable, for the honorary organiser expected, to have the assistance of from eight hundred to a thousand committees right through the As Sir James Young points out, a brief ktay in one of these camps means the laying of a foundation of good health which will be of inestimable benefit to the children in after life. It is a humanitarian movement certainly, but it is more than that, for it will mean a help to the State in its efforts to build up a population sound in mind and body. This campaign is to be commended without reserve. It is practical in its aims and scope, and no one can challenge the statement that the results from it will be considerable. Confidence is felt that there will be a generous response. It does not mean much self-denial on the part of the individual, and it is hard to imagine a better cause. So that there should be no misunderstanding about the matter is is emphasised that all money collected in the Dunedin district will be spent for the benefit of the children residing in that area.