Hydatids

Press, Volume LXXXVII, Issue 26515, 1 September 1951, Page 6

Hydatids

Dr. A. Douglas, Medical Officer of Health for South Canterbury and North Otago, was preaching to the converted when he addressed representatives of South Canterbury local bodies on hydatids recently; but what he had to say deserves wider attention. For that reason the meeting’s decision to circulate a full report of his address in pamphlet form is welcome. Dr. Douglas made two points that should stir the public conscience. The first, which should already be well enough known, is that hydatids could become a disease of the past if the proper and reasonable precautions were taken. The second was that hydatids has become a national reproach, for which New Zealand has become known overseas. As to the second, no thinking person can be happy in the knowledge that in New Zealand there are 2000 cases of hydatids (of which he may be one and know nothing of it for anything up to 20 years), and that 200 of those cases are “irrevocably condemned “to death”. For the control of the disease, Dr. Douglas recommended the measures that have been advocated again and again, without much impression being v>ade on successive governments and on the owners of dogs. If every dog was regularly dosed with arecoline and if all meat for dogs was properly cooked before they ate it the disease would be slowly but surely eradicated. The ultimate responsibility for doing these things in their own interests, in the interests of their families, and in the interests of the community rests with the owners of dogs; but, since they have shown indifference, Government action td make their failure a criminal offence should be taken. “The crime is not in being “ lousy, but in being lousy and doing

“ nothing about it—so it is with “hydatids ”, Dr. Douglas told his hearers at Timaru. His address should be the more effective because it was temperate. He did not claim that arecoline was 100 per cent, effective, though in conjunction with the other sensible precautions he outlined the long-term result would be the same. Nor did he suggest the drastic method of killing all dogs and importing new ones, by which Iceland stamped out the disease. That would be an impossibility for New Zealand; but less drastic action will serve as well in time. In a country where hydatids is apparently taken so lightly, the, persistence of South Canterbury local bodies in trying to organise control of the disease in at least a limited area is commendable. It is unfortunate that their plan seems likely to be frustrated by the reluctance of the Mackenzie County Council to co-operate with the others. It may be hoped that Dr. Douglas’s address (with its reference to a recent case at Fairlie) may influence people in the Mackenzie County towards recognition of their responsibility, and of their danger.