Minimum in Infant Mortality

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 82, 28 June 1927, Page 16

Minimum in Infant Mortality

DOMINION’S SUCCESS PLUNKET SOCIETY’S WORK (THE SUM'S Parliamentary Reporter.) WELLINGTON, Monday. \\TbHLE t he infant death rate in New Zealand has reached the enviable position of being the lowest in the world,, particularly in respect to babies of one month and under, it is the aim of the Government to proceed along the lines already being traversed, till it reaches the spot which can with assurance be termed the irreducible minimum. This much was inferred by the Alininster of Health, the Hon. J. H. Young, when addressing the Royal Society for Health of Women and Children tonight. The Minister showed, by the quotation of figures, the progress which bad been made in this direction during the 20 yeai*£ which the society had been in existence. In the first year of its operations, 1907, 88.8 a thousand babies died during the first year of life. Of these 30.4 died during the first month and 58.4 after the first month and within 12 months. This tendency was maintained till 1910, when the figures showed that 67.8 died in the first year, 30.2 in the first month, and 30.7 between one and twelve months. Since that, time, however, the balance had swung the other way and in 1911 50.3 a thousand died in the first year, 28.5 in the first month, and 27.8 over one month and under one year. In 3 925 the'figures were 40 a thousand, 26 4 dying in the first month and 13.5 after the first month and within the year. Last year the total was reduced to 39.8 a thousand, those dying within the month being 25.4, and those after that, and within 12 months 14.3. “We have got to an interesting stage in this connection.” said the Minister. "We are trying to discover, by the activities of your society and the department, what is the irreducible minimum. So far v’e have not been able to get this, but these figures indicate that we must be coming somewhere close to it, that is so far as the deaths within the first 12 months are concerned. This is something of which New Zealand has reason to feel proud.”