OUR BABIES.

King Country Chronicle, Volume VIII, Issue 658, 8 April 1914, Page 2

OUR BABIES.

Published under the auspices of the Society for the Health of Women and Children. " It is wiser to put up a fence at the top of a precipice than to maintain an ambulance at the bottom." EPIDEMIC INFANTILE PARALYSIS. The following letter, just received from parents in the country, is worth publishing, because it represents the state of anxiety prevalent throughout the Dominion, owing to the unusual number of caßeß of Infantile Paralysis that have occurred during the last few months.:— ANXIOUS PARENTS. We have a baby six morths old who is troubled with her teeth. Would you be kind enough to tell me how one could distinguish between the incipient istage of infantile paralysis and ordinarv teething trouble? Further, what remedial or preventive meaßuies could be taken in fighting infantile parlysis? For instance, we have another child of sis years going to school, ani one of her playmates has taken the disease. What should we do in those circumstances? I am encouraged to write to you in this matter, because our baby is a splendid specimen, under care of the Plunket Nurse. —Yours faithfully, ANXIOUS PARENT. REPLY.

Nothing very definite ia known regarding the causation and spread of infantile paralysis. No doubt it ia due to a specific micro-organism, which will be identified in due course. Meantime all one can aay iB that the disease is spread from infected persons to others, and possibly also by flies. In any case, you should rid your vicinity of flies if you are troubled with them. Get rid of all refuse, garbage, dung, etc., that would attract and harbour flies, and poison or trap them by any of the usual means —flypapers, etc. However, there is in my opinion almost no ground for anxiety now, because the heavy rain which has fallen and the approach of winter will in all probability have brought the epidemic to an end. The fact of a playmate having contracted the disease naturally makes you anxious; but you should clearly understand that all auch epidemics tend to run their course and die out, at least for a time. It may recur next Beaßon, but this will not necessarily be the case, and you may be comforted by the fact that there havn ! been mild epidemicß of infantile ! paralysis in New Zealand in the past without their leading to any permanent establishment of the malady as a common one. Indeed, thu present epidemic has been mild, and the tatal number of children affected small. There is no reason for taking a gloomy view as to;the future.

Thinking that there would be a general desire for definite information regarding what has been discovered up to the present time as to the precise characteristics of the virus of infantile paralysis, I submitted the question to Dr Champtaloup, Professor of Bacteriology at Otago University. He says that while the individual microbe has not so far been made visible to the microscope, and is evidently extraordinarily minute, it has, nevertheless, been detected in the "colony-form," and haa been cultivated. The cultures give rise to the disease when lower animals such aa monkeys are inoculated, and they can also be infected by meanß of washinga from the nose and throat of infected persons. The most dangerous habitant appears to be the nose, from which it is held that the germs spread to the fluids of the brain and spinal cord, and are thua able to give rise to the characteristic forms of paralysis of any part of the body. Professor Champtaloup says that the virus varies in strength in different epidßmcs. "The Swedish epidemic of 1911 appears to have been specially virulent, the typical American epidemics have been less so, and the English and Australasian epidemics seem to be still milder. The virus is capable of withstanding the action of the gastric and other juices. It is not known to multiply, except in an infected individual (man or animal), and to ensure propagation of the disease it must escape from the infected person. This has been shown to occur along with the secretions of the nose and throat, and the discharges from the intestines." INFECTION BY MEANS OF DUST, SPUTUM, AND INSECTS. "The virus can survive in a dry Btate, and monkeys have been infected by the sweepings from rooms in which cases of infantile paralysis had been nursed. This activity may account to some extent for the frequency of the disease in infants, who, creeping along the floor, would run the greatest risk of getting the 'infected dust into the nose and throat." THE BEST PREVENTIVE. ™ The best preventive is to keep the child in the best possible general health, on the linesfshown on pages 1 and 2of the Society's Book ("Feeding and Care of Baby"). Of all things plenty of pure, cool, freah air, with the avoidance of undue draughts, if of the first importance. One cannot insist too strongly on sensible clothing, with due consideration for the temperature and windiness —or calmness —of the particular day. Bedmaking should be guided by what is said on page 5 of the Society's book. Proper care with regard to food, feeding, regularity of meals, and regularity of the bowels are of the first importance. The organism is never so ready to admit microscopic foes from the outside, and allow them to gain a foothold, aa when the cells are being poisoned and weakened all the time by chronic constipations and indigestion. Regular exercise and exposure to the open air and sunlight are of almost equal importance.

The onset of infantile paralysis is marked by severe pain in the back, high fever, and vomiting—something quite differennt, as a rule, from the milder fever and mera fretfulness, dribblirg, and fingering the mouth characteristic of teething. But sometimes the symptoms preceding actual paralysis are very slight and insidious and may pass quite unnoticed. In such cases the first things to attract the attention of the mother is the fact that the child has lost muscular power in some region. On the other hand the first distinct note of warning may be convulsions—this being especially liable to occur in babies. Natuarlly, you would call in a doctor if there were any doubt whatever; but at the present moment parents are all rather over anxious about infantile paralysis, and, I think, the risks are practically at an end for the present season. I should not keep a child away from school, even where there has been a case of the disease in one of the pupils attending the school. I trust that all will go well, and that you will have no cause for further worry.