OUR BABIES.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 2389, 2 January 1909, Page 10 (Supplement)

OUR BABIES.

(By Hygoia.)

Published under the auspices of the Society for the Promotion oi „the Health of Women and Children. WHY DO BABIES FAIL? An excellent course of “Lectures on Babies” -delivered recently pi London -by Dr. Ralph Vincent, senior physician to the infants’ Hospital, Westminster, has just been published, and the author’s remarks on the subject of malnutrition are especial.y interesting and forcible. At tho outset Dr. Vincent sets bunself the tisk of probing to the bottom the present unsatisfactory condition of infant life, and tries to arrive at the causes. . After giving some striking statistics -he proceeds : “We -have therefore to find some factor Avhich can account _. for this enormous infantile mortality. It cannot be accounted l for by conditions at birth, and there is no question as to the cause of death — WRONG FEEDING —absence of food adequate in quality for the physiological requirements ot infant life.” Dr. Hall dealt with the _ most serious question of all, when, in the year 1903, he examined 2335 Board School children in the city of Leeds and the neighborhood. He found, more than half of these children suffering from rickets, and l considerably more than half had decaying or badly, developed teeth; apJLit is- to this phase of our subject limit I now Avish to direct your attention. However great tho mortality may be, it is not so serious a question, from the national point of view, as is tho condition of the 'babies Avho, suffering from the. conditions responsible for this mortality, manage to survive in a condition of hopeless malnutrition. I Avill give you a brief list of the conditions as they affect children to-day. RICKETS AND DEGENERATION. Rickets is to be observed in every town —large and small —in an enormous proportion of the population. (Memo. —Colonials sometimes flatter themselves that this disease -rarely occurs in our midst, but tins is an absurd fallacy. Extreme and obvious crippling is not often seen, but a degree of rickets manifesting itself in indigestion, bad teeth, slight bandy-legs, and more or less general stunting a<nd deformity of -the frame is quite common, even in country places.) Regarding the mentally defective children who -are requiring so much of our attention to-day, there is not the smallest question that infantile malnutrition is the primary cause of their condition. Physical and mental deficiencies of all possible kinds are caused bv this .malnutrition, and the lunatic asylums are being filled with its results. WANT OF STAMINA—CAN’T HOLDMXUT.

Striking illustrations of the effect of malnutrition in infancy jnay he seen in the hospitals for scarlet fever and measles. As a rule a healthy child infected with measles or scarlet fever suffers for a time during the acute state of the disease, and then makes a ’ complete recovery, so that it Is not uncommon to -hear a mother say that the child seems all tlie better for it. On the other hand when you are dealing with a child who has -been the victim of infantile malnutrition, the picture is altogether different. The resistance to disease, the power of combating the disease, is largely lost, and instead’ of the infant making a good- recovery, it dies or it tends to become the victim of all kinds of complications and sequelae, such as cerebral disease, middle-ear disease, and the like. If those of you- who have an, opportunity of watching these cases will takel on the one hand, the instances of middle-ear disease and all such complications in which the ear or brain or the bones are .attacked; and Avill at the same time note -whether these children exhibit signs of malnutrition and rickets, 1 haA 7 c not the smallest hesitation in predicting the result of your observations. In the vast majority of cases it is the infant suffering from deformities, from w-lio Avill suffer from the complications I have referred to. CONSUMPTION. Let me illustrate the same thing by drawing your attention to hospitals for diseases of the chest, particularly pulmonary tuberculosis. You Avill find that the vast proportion of adults, young adults about 25 years of age, suffering from phthisis, exhibit obAuous and clear signs of. rickets affecting . the chest. Rickets is tho cause—the primary oause—of their condition, because it injures the chest Avail, prevents the expansion of the -lungs, diminishes the resistance of all the tissues, and the bacillus of tuberculosis simply plays the part of an infecting agent, which tho /young adult, by reason of his weakened condition, can no longer resist.. If it A\ r ere true that the tu'berculo bacillus was capable of affecting healthy adults, and inducing tluj lesions of tuberculosis in the healthy chest, none of ais would be sale, and tlio Ayliole population would, bo destroyed in a very short time. Tlu> AAhole question of tuberculosis is a question, on the one hand, of your resistance to it; and the reason for the prevalence of tuberculosis is simply that the resistance of individuals is weakened to such an extent that they. have no longer any adequate power to combat the inroads of pathogenic organisms. BAD TEETH.

I select one other illustration which is only too obvious to-day, and that is the condition of the teeth. At the'' time of birth the teeth —the primary teeth —are fully developed in the jaw of the infant. They have not erupted, but they exist, fully made, in the gums. Directly we hud any condition affecting the growth of the bone, affecting the structure of the tissues, we find at once the eruption of the teeth is interfered with and -delayed. And I cannot impress upon you too strongly the terrible injury that results dn all cases where there: is delay aiid irregularity in the appearance of the first teeth. 'lt is not much any-question of the condition of tlie primary teeth when they erupt, because""the real injury is to tho second teeth which are to follow. Unless- tho > milk teeth- follow a perfect normal the formation of the enamel germ of the second dentition is interfered with. The result is that a series of pathological processes are started within -a lew months of the birth of the infant, with tlio consequence that the

second ' teeth are badly formed, w inadequate in structure, and deficient in hard enamel, which is -a. piotection against the inroads -of all kind* of organisms, acids, and othei de&truct ivo agents. In order to fi " d for the present condition of teeth.in all clises, you have to go back to the JT&M *" tS 1 W tIm |BETH“xN. r NBW°ZEA'LAND. Those who attended the . annual meeting of our Society in Dunedin will remember that in a striking address, fgiven by Dr. 1 ickerelL . the he id of the Dental School at Otago University, 'he laid special stress on the importance of building sound, good teeth in babyhood, and the fact that if the “baby teeth” decayed early there was a very poor chance for "the rjermanent set. He deplored the lamentable sta'e of children s teeth as ho found them in New Zealand, and drew an .unfavorable contrast in this .respect between our own rising generation and that of the Home Coutrv ,though the condition of children’s teeth in England is admittingly had. TEETH AT HOME. Decent investigations, as reported on by Iloyal Commissions set up to inquire into physical degeneration manifested in army recruits, etc., have brought out the uact that aefectivo teeth are largely responsible. Mr Watt Smyth, in his book I nysical Degeneration,” commenting on. medical evidence brought forward, “It would appear that if the progress of calcification in the permanent set of teeth is disturbed during infancy or early childhood, aaiy damage then done is never recovered from. An acute illness will mark teeth by a line just as the nails may be similarly marked, so that the nutrition of the teeth is interfered with in the sense that it is stopped or checked for a time. This line, of course, marks the edge of the-dentine formed at the date of the illness, and thus does not occur on all the teeth •at the same level. Further, it is well known that stomatitis (inflammation of the jaws, gums, etc.) will interfere greatly with the formation of enamel, although it is not- known to affect the dentine, which is often of good formation under a ‘honeycombed enamel. In children suffering from rickets, the temporary teeth are often seen to he broken or ground almost to the gums: .* . The mischief can he increased by neglect-. „ing to brush first teeth. As a matter of fact they are generally altogether neglected, for the public do not seem to' realise that a carious milk tooth can perfectly well cause a permanent tooth cut alongside of it (to become carious also.” ' There would he little to complain of in regard to the teeth of the generation to come if women would only pay more .attention to ensuring tie infant as suitable food as possible, whether suckled or artifically fed; and if they would also pay proper attention to fresh air, exercise, clothing, and other hygienic measures ef strongly condemned. j sential ~ to the health of the bab| The “dummy” or comforter” Ins much to answer for in spoiling digestion and damaging the embryo teetn and jaws. Its use.cannot be td> strongly condemned.— 1