TYPHOID AMONG MAORIS.
DISCLOSURES AT RATANA
“APPALLING CONDITIONS.”
The Health Department has for some little time been worried by a typhoid epidemic among the Maori population. In Hawkes Bay over 40 cases, with several deaths, have occurred, and there are now 32 cases in the Ha-pier Hospital, threo in Waipukurau Hospital, and four in the Dannevirke Hospital. Attention has consequently been focused on Native living conditions. Many of .the victims, states the “Wanganui Chronicle,” are known to have been at Ratana, while others have attended the big Ratana rallies held in outside districts, as at Onialni, Hawkes Bay. “The Maoris have lately been moving about so much,” said Dr. M’Kibbin on Saturday, “that they are on all all fours with a mobile army. The Department has therefore adopted the pratice of the British Army, and inoculating, where possible, with antityphoid vaccine.” Recently over 1000 Hawkes Bay Maoris were vaccinated, largely by Dr. Buck, the Director of Native Hygiene, and on Friday departmental officials visited Ratana to carry on the process there.
HEALTH OFFICER’S REPORT. On Friday 2(50 Natives at the Ratana encampment were inoculated, but the outstanding feature of the visit, according to Dr. M’Kibbin was the discovery, of appaling living conditions at the village, and the* Health authorities intend to compel the subscribers to the Ratana movement to improve the sanitation of their headquarters. “The village has been constructed in defiance of elementary principles,” said Dr. M’Kibbin, “and constitutes a definite element ot' danger to the whole population' of the country,, since from 500 to 2000 Natives congregate there from time to time.”
The position concerning the Ratana village is that it has grown very considerably as the membership in the Ratana movement has grown, and now consists of
“streets” of cottages, set close together. Such amenities as baths have been provided in many cases, but there is no community water or drainage system, and it is to the absence of these that the authorities take particularly strong exception. Dr. M’Kibbin said that it is absolutely imperative and urgent that the Rangitikei County Council pass a by-law, at the earliest- opportunity, prohibiting, under the Health Act, the bulling in the Ratana area of any dwelling on less than a quarter of an acre of land, and compelling the institution of water and drainage systems.
“It cannot go on,” lie said, “as no system of inspection can deal with the house wastes from dwellings so close together.” Touching on the general methods of controlling sanitary conditions among the Maoris, Dr. M‘Kibbin said the matter was in the hands of local committees working under Native councils. Under this system, which was controlled by the Department, satisfactory condi tions ruled in most other places, and big Native villages such as Paki Paid and Omahu, in Hawkes Bay, were kept in a sanitary condition.
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Manawatu Herald, Volume XLVIII, Issue 3039, 22 May 1926, Page 1
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471TYPHOID AMONG MAORIS. Manawatu Herald, Volume XLVIII, Issue 3039, 22 May 1926, Page 1
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