RURAL HYGIENE CONFERENCE

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22194, 10 September 1937, Page 2

RURAL HYGIENE CONFERENCE

Health Questions In The East RESULTS OF GREAT VALUE EXPECTED (FROU oca OWN CORRESPONDENT.} GENEVA, August s.'' The third of the conferences on Rural Hygiene which the League's Health Organisation has convened was opened in Bandoeng (Java) on August 3. This conference was devoted to problems of public health in rural districts of countries of the East. The first conference on Rural Hygiene was held in Geneva in 1931 and discussed public health problems of Ec-slern European countries—rural buildings, sanitation, food supply, and even some questions such as insurance and credit which go beyond the medi-, cal field and indicate how the maintenance of proper health standards may by bound up with social and economic conditions. Two conferences were held in South Africa in 1932 and 1935 and dealt with the special conditions which affect public health in Africa. Now the movement has spread to the Far East, and toward the end of 1938 it is expected that a similar conference on Rural Hygiene will be held for the American countries in Mexico City.

The holding of this conference in Bandoeng reflects the concern which Eastern authorities are feeling for the health of their peoples. Ideas of standards of living in terms of the health and nutrition of rural populations are spreading throughout countries of the East. The findings resulting from the Rural Hygiene Conferences held in the West may now be discussed in the interest of the millions of country dwellers which make up the vast majority of the great populations of the East. Subjects for Discussion The conference discussions have been prepared for by a Preparatory Committee which has drawn up a report showing the chief problems of medicine and public health that have a special bearing on the health of rural inhabitants of Eastern countries. The subjects for discussion are: <1) Healtn and medical services; (2) Rural reconstruction and collaboration of the population; (3) Sanitation and sanitary engineering; 14) Nutrition, (5) Measures for combating certain diseases in rural districts. On each of these questions, the Preparatory C.ommittees report furnishes factual data and observations drawn from preliminary inquiries. , , , . . The chapter of the report which deals with health and medical services states the problem which arises when East meets West in the field of medicine. "European medical science is everywhere invading Asia, where it Encounters what has remained of the old medical lore oi Hindu medicine, the Arabian school and the old Chinese institutions, all of them based upon traditional empiricism. The importance of all this should not be underestimated. and official medicdl science, overconfident of its own infallibility and of the inferiority of this ancient popular medicine, has made the mistake of scorning it Yet many an old precept can be found which accords with our own view’s, even though put in a somewhat different form. Thus, frequently we strongly oppose the use of the medicinal herbs and other substances of popular Eastern medicine, forgetting that our own pharmaceutical industry has produced, in addition to sound and valuable medicines, much that it would have been better never to administer to any sufferer. “The study of these ancient medical cultures and of their remaining vestiges would be of value. They should have a place in the training so that the young doctor may have at least an elementary knowledge of these questions when he begins practising. Such knowledge is essential if he is to adapt himself to his social environment. “Exchange of Views Desirable” “Last, it would be desirable honestly to consider how far these old medical traditions can be reconciled with our own principles, instead of them in a body as useless and obsolete. This, too, is a subject on which an exchange of views would.be desirable; it has incidentally been broached already by a commission appointed by the League Health Committee, and might with advantage be taken up again.” The report declares that a general awakening is taking place among the rural districts of Eastern countries, and a new awareness to the importance of public health is dawning upon them. “With the perception of the possibility of improved conditions of life is growing the desire to attain them. The progress of education is having its effect. Interest is being shown in the improvement of health, in economic problems and in all matters which affect the maintenance of a reasonable standard of living. The dullness of village life is being dissipated by the dawn of rural reconstruction. No longer does all the peasantry live, as in the words of the Malay proverb, ‘like a frog under a coconut shell, in a tiny world of its own.’ ” The importance of education and of the spread of the co-operative movement is stressed, and methods by which health authorities enlist the interest and support of the peasants are described. One of the chief results to be expected from the conference is that improved contacts will be established among the health administrations of different countries and colonies, and even of different provinces of given countries, as, for example, India. At present these authorities often work at identical or similar problems without the advantage of knowing each other's results.