FIGHTING THE DISEASE.

Taranaki Daily News, 27 November 1918, Page 4

FIGHTING THE DISEASE.

Monday's meeting at New Plymouth might just as '-veil have decided to close down for the full week instead of adopting a suggestion to leave the question of closing after Thursday in the hands of the Mayor, the medical superintendent of the hospital, and the executive of the Citizens' Health Committee, for it is clear fr.vn the reports that the town is by no means "out of the wood" yet, and is not iikely to be for some days, even with the maintenance of the organisation that is doing such splendid work. The H;a,lth Committee itself advertises that no one should go back to work until his temperature has been normal for t<m days, and only then if feeling fit and strong, and can walk uphll without being seriously affected. There are to-diy in the town over eleven hundred people actually Buffering from influenza, and, this being the case, and the risk of infection as shown above and endorsed by rha doctors, being so great, how can the town be safely opened to normal busino»s until Monday at the earliest? Dr. Walker certainly advised the meeting t<. close till Thursday, and to reconsider the position then, but no doubt in making this proposal the doctor was animated by a desire not to put the town out urduly, end with a due appieeiation of the loss entailed. But all the evidence and facts before us show .that there is enly one course open to the community, and that is to keep closed, preserve the fighting force and defeat the epidemic absolutely No dmbt it will be shown on Thursday that the town will have to remain closed until Saturday. Great a3 is the dislocation and financial loss entailed, there can be no question that we have to submit to it in order to thoroughly stamp out the disease. It is a question of life and death, and everything else must-be subordinate to it. Then there is the country to consider. It is clear that the conditions there are rapidly getting worse, and that to combat it and save lii?. the town organisation must throw its whole weig'.t into the fight, and assist the settlers (already sorely handicapped by the shortage of labor and the necessity for milking the herds) to org&sise their own districts. If the diserse assumes n virulent character there, as unfortunately seemß inevitable, the dajger of the town becoming infected [again is very rra!. In that case all the work that has been carried out bo successfully will have to be done over agpin, and po3sibly the proportion of serious cases vill be materially greater The tow.i is to a man behind the medical superintendent of the hospital in this greatest of all battles the community has e-.er been called upon to wage, and if tc morrow evening he says it is necessary to close down till Mon-day-or even longer—we feel sure his advice will be cVufully followed. 1