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H—3l

The following graphs show how imperfect nutrition in the first year leads to the deaths attributed (luring the next four years to specific causes such as bronchitis, pneumonia, measles, and tuberculosis. The bodies of well-nourished children form a soil hostile to the microbes of disease, and if the germs do gain a temporary foothold they rarely kill the vigorous, healthy child or maim it for life as so often occurs in the case of the flabby, soft, sometimes fat children whose tissues havje poor resistive and defensive powers.

Graph showing that the main cause for parents having to seelc medioal advice for their babies is what are roughly classed in statistics as " digestive disturbances."

Graph made from the Registrar-General's statistics compiled from tho New Zealand medical certificates of death during 1921, showing what are the registered causes of deaths occurring in the second, third, fourth, and fifth years of life per 1,000 deaths.

It will be noted that, while it is estimated that 90 per cent, of infantile ailments come under the rough heading " digestive disturbances " or imperfect, nutrition, only 9 per cent, of the children who die in their second, third, fourth, and fifth years are certified as having actually succumbed, to " digestive diseases." However, with few exceptions, the predisposing cause has been defective tone and nutrition of the body, leading to invasion of the system and death attributed to specific microbes of epidemic, respiratory, and other diseases. As Dr. Almond, of Lorctto (one of the greatest of Scotch schoolmasters), said ; "We ought to turn out the schoolboy pretty well germ-proof. ... I only wish there was a, word to express that normal and glorious condition of being which ought to be that of the average man and woman. Perhaps in some future century, when the perfection of the human animal is regarded as of equal importance with the perfection of the steam-engine, there will be such a word." F. Trury King, Director of Child Welfare.

PART V.—NURSING. SECTION I—NURSES REGISTRATION ACT. Examinations wore held under the Nurses Registration Act in June, 1921, and December, 1921. 267 candidates presented themselves for examining, of whom 224 were successful and are now on the State register. Seventy-three nurses from overseas have been registered, their certificates from their trainingschools still being accepted, as tho State registers o England and Wales, Scotland, and Ireland have not yet been published. In future it will be advisable to require from all applicants from countries where a nurses registration law is in force proof that they have been registered in the country from which they come. The need of reciprocity in registration throughout the British Empire is very apparent. A great number of letters from nurses desiring to come out to New Zealand have been received. These women in many instances appear to be well qualified, and the majority have served during the war, some with distinction, but tho state of nursing affairs during the past year has not been such that they could be encouraged to come out. They have therefore been advised not to come unless they have friends or means which will permit them to wait for suitable employment. Despite this many have come, as well as many others who have not written beforehand to make inquiries. Nurses from the Australian States have also come to the Dominion seeking work, and, in spite of the fact that a good many of our own nurses are now working temporarily in England, South Africa, and America, there are many private nurses in all centres who have to await cases for considerable periods. People are more and more going to the general hospitals for treatment, and, if nursed at their own homes, dispense with their nurses at much earlier periods than formerly. There are few positions now vacant in public hospitals which cannot be filled by the trainees a,s they qualify.

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