FOUR SUSPECTS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26634, 3 December 1947, Page 6

FOUR SUSPECTS

AUCKLAND HOSPITAL ADMISSIONS NO MORE POSITIVE CASES P.A. AUCKLAND, Dec. 2. No further positive cases of infantile paralysis were diagnosed in the Auckland district to-day. Four more suspected cases, however, were admitted to the Auckland Hospital, while two of the former suspects, having proved negative, were removed from the list. Seventeen positive cases and six suspects remained in the hospital to-night. All four of the suspected cases admitted to-day were young children except one, a youth of 17 years.

The first case reported in the Hamilton health district during the present outbreak, occurred to-day, when a youth of 17, from Te Awamutu, was admitted to the Waikato Hospital. The case has been diagnosed as positive. The decision, to extend the prohibition of children attending picture theatres and all public gatherings to include all those under 16 was announced by the Health Department. It was also announced that the question of prohibiting children under 16 from travelling from the Central Auckland health district was under consideration by the department, and that a decision would be made in the next few days. Precautions in Hospitals Precautions at the Auckland Hospital Board’s institutions have been announced by- the superintendent-in-chief, Mr H. Selwyn Kenrick.

He said that m institutions with children’s wards it had been decided that visitors to the children would be restricted to parents or legal guardians. No children under 16 would be allowed to visit the public hospitals. In addition, hose and throat operations would be reduced and confined in cases in which surgeons considered early operations essential.

“ Our staff is highly qualified to deal with illnesses, including infantile paralysis—as highly qualified as any in the world,” said Mr Kenrick when asked if the latest methods of treating infantile paralysis in use abroad were being applied in Auckland. He added that there was nothing new in the treatment, and the pamphlet being sent out by the Health Department was to summarise the - information already known and to serve as a refresher. The services of outstanding physicians, orthopaedic specialists and experts in physiotherapy were available to the patients in hospital, Mr Kenrick said. The public must realise, however, that there was no magical treatment available. No Known Cure

The convalescent serum used in the past had been very disappointing, and its use was no longer advised. Treatment was remedial, there being no specific medicine or serum known as a cure such as quinine for malaria. Mr Kenrick said the Health Department had arranged for a panel of consulting physicians, comprised of the senior physicians in the hospitals, to be available so that if an outside doctor were in doubt he could call on one of them to see the patient. This had been done to aid diagnosis and also to avoid flooding the hospital with mild suspects.