THE VERY POOR: HOW THEY LIVE.

Waikato Argus, Volume IV, Issue 255, 5 March 1898, Page 2 (Supplement)

THE VERY POOR: HOW THEY LIVE.

NkvEß, perhaps, was a year in which hospitals attracted so large a share of public attention as they have done in the ono wh'ch is now draw ing to a close. To a groat extent this has been due the fact that while nation"! sentiment has mnrked it as a year of jubiles—a year in which to celebrate the more than Jubilee of her Majesty's reign—the royal desire as intimated by H.R.H. tho Prince of Wales, has been that the celebration of the event should take the form of suppuit to hospitals. Thus it ha* happened that a great deal of public interest has been •xe'ted in regard to theso institutions - an interest whieh has not always shown itself in tho form of a donation. Christmas time is a time when we should bo in charity with all men, and when this charity should especially take the fo>m of help to the feeble and the sick ; and at this time in particular it seems appropriate that wc should again urge the claims of the hospitals, and that we should enforce attention to the fact that, notwithst .nding all talk about abuso and about reform, and notwithstanding thtt there may be s "in - basis for believing that in certaiii matter* hospitals, like everything else, are capable of some improvement, they are in the main doing an enormous amount of good good of a sort thut cannot, bo done by any other means, and in a way for .vhich no substitute has been or can bo discovered

The great central fact wlich has to bo recognised is that tho lives of tho roas-es the modes of life imposed upon great numbers of our fellow citizens by the mexort.be demands of whit wc arc pleased to call modern civilisation—are such that when they f til ill it is impossib'c, on the one hand, for them to provide for themselves the medical attendance '•bat i s necessary ; and, on the other, for them to retei e p oper bei efit from that attendance, even if it could be had, so long bs they remain amid the surrounding- in which they have been taken illsurroundings whieh, in far too mmy ills' unce, have themselves been the real cause of the illness. Hero aud there a well-to-do perso.t may g-vn access to a hospi'al and may cheat tli3 subnetihern ; hut that should n>t harden our hearts and close our pockets, for these cases arc lost in the mass of the rc.illy poor and of the really deserving, for whom, if help is to come at all, it must conic in the form of hospital Ireamunt. . . Some of the tenements occupied by Inme worker?, arc said to be filthy in the extreme, the very dirt of the places rendering it out of the question to attempt to treat the sick in such habitations. " Armed with a box of matches and a tap'r, and battling with what seem to be the almost solid smells of the place, one finally reaches the top, and on being admitted finds perhaps a room almost destitute of furniture, the work lying in piles upon the dirty floor or doing dti'y as bedclothes for a bedridden invalid and members of the fami'y generally." It is obvious at the very fust glance that it is impossible to treat sickness amid such conditions. . . .

Now. has not all this bearing on what we so often hear about hospital abuse ? Even if we were to grant all that is said against hospitals—a thing which we should not think of doing for a moment —that would not take away from the immensity of the real distress which hospitals alone are able to relieve. What we have to bear in mind is that home workers - are in very many cases among the most thrifty, the most careful, and the most honest of the various classes into which we may divide the poor. Economically all sorts of evil things arc said against them by the rest of the working community. It is said that it is the eagerness of the horns worker for work that keeps down wages, and it may be so ; but at least this is to be said, that it is by dint of what the world counts to them for virtues—thrift, sobriety, honesty, and punctuality—that they are able to live as they do, aud that at least the people who exercise these virtues, year in and year out, tiil sickness overtakes them, deserve something letter than the workhouse when that dreaded event happens. Let us look at the household expenditure of a widow who has kept herse f and a little girl on 6s a week, " for rent and everything" : Rent, one room, 2s a week ; : [ b tea, 4i ; 21l> sugar, 3d ; flour 2 l d ; \\h margarine, 3-J-d ; six eggs (chipped), other vegetables, Hd ; bread, 4Ad ; "kitche-i," a term used to denote any little relidi to make up a meal, 2d or 3d ; —making a total of about 4s 7d or 4s Sd a week. Again, take the details given by tho wife'of a cobbhr earning 13s a week, with four children—the eldest 11 years, the youngest eight months : Bread, sgd per day ; tea and sugar, 3d ; " kitchen," 4d ; milk, 2d; butter, 3d ; coals, Is 2J per week ; oil 3d. She " counts on keeping the six of them on 15d from Saturday to Monday." Now, we ask, Where is the elasticity in such an expenditure ? Where is the reserve to st'ind tho strain of sickness ? We answer that thero is no elasticity and there is no reserve, and unless thrifty, careful, self-supporting working people like these are to be thrown into the workhouso when ill, tho hospitals ore an absolute necessity in the present condition of our social system.—The Hospital.