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Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 517, 21 November 1928, Page 6

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HEALTH RESTRICTIONS LIFTED SCARLET FEVER EPIDEMICS Press Association CHRISTCHURCH, Tuesday. After a conference this morning between representatives of the Health Department and of the Canterbury Education Board the restrictions imposed on the attendance of children under 10 years of ago at schools in the Christchurch metropolitan area in consequence of the epidemic of scarlet fever have been lifted. The lower classes in the majority of schools will be resumed to-morrow and pupils at several of tlie schools will be medically examined by officers of the Health Department. Dr. Valintine stated to-day that scarlet fever was a disease which in New Zealand had usually run a course of from two to three years. An epidemic about 12 years ago, and one again about 12 years before that, gave much greater death rates and effects than did the present epidemic, which had been running through the Dominion for nearly two years, and in Christchurch in particular for over one year. In the former epidemics as many as 90 deaths would occur in one year. Last year throughout the Dominion there were 16 deaths from scarlet fever and up to date this year the number was about 20. The reason the department considered it advisable that a close examination should be made of children attending certain schools was that in addition to clear cases of scarlet fever there were some instances of children witli red growths, who, while not suffering severely from tho disease, probably were a factor in its spread. It is possible that the school dental clinics will shortly be reopened.