SACRIFICE BY LEPERS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 8 December 1939, Page 6

SACRIFICE BY LEPERS

f OFFER OF £lOO TO RED CROSS FROM FUNDS COLLECTED IN NEW ZEALAND. LOYAL DESIRE TO HELP EMPIRE. Mr P. J. Twomey, hon secretary of the Makogai Leper Fund, has received an unanimous request from the 619 lepers at Makogai asking that £lOO of the money collected for them in New Zealand be handed to the Red Cross as a token of gratitude for what New Zealand has done to help them. The letter is signed by twelve patients representing the different communities resident on the Island. The Medical Superintendent, Dr C. J. Austin, in forwarding on this request, said: “I do not know how you will regard their appeal, but I can assure you the patients will be very disappointed if you turn down their request They are intensely loyal and are eagerly following the news over the air and in the papers. They are now hoping that you will give them the opportunity of feeling that they are contributing in a small way to the necessities of the Empire, and they would rather join in the New Zealand effort in this direction as a gesture of appreciation of the generosity of the New Zealand people. >“I do not think that this offer of theirs will prejudice the success of future appeals—rather the reverse. It would be a very ungenerous criticism to suggest that it is evident that the patients have more money than they need and I cannot think that your subscribers would object to the patients using the money in this way, or wish to deprive the patients of their happiness and pride at being one with the New Zealanders in this gift.”