TUBERCULOSIS IN PACIFIC

Press, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 27073, 23 June 1953, Page 10

TUBERCULOSIS IN PACIFIC

HUGE PROBLEM IN PHILIPPINES

NEW ZEALAND DOCTOR’S

In New Zealand the worst of the tuberculosis problem was over, but in the Philippines and other crowded countries in the Pacific there was a huge problem, which only recently had been tackled on any large scale, said Dr. J. M. Wogan, Director of the Tuberculosis Division of the Health Department, last evening. He was addressing the annual meeting of the South Island Tuberculosis Association on the PanPacific conference on tuberculosis held in Manila in April under the joint sponsorship of the Philippine Tuberculosis Society, and Philippine Health Department and World Health Organisation. Delegates from about 30 Pacific organisations attended. The death rate of Maoris was about eight times that of the Europeans, Dr. Wogan said, and one of the main reasons was the crowded conditions in many Maori homes which allowed the easy spread of tubercle bacilli. Yet overseas the crowded conditions of natives had to be seen to_.be believed, and whereas the percentage of infection among Maori children of 15 was 20 or 30 per cent, of the population of that age, in the Philippines 80 or 90 per cent, of the children of 10 were infected. The Philippines had a population of 19,000,000, of whom 2,000,000 lived in Manila, an area about half the size of Sydney, which had not fully recovered from the Japanese occupation. Dr. Wogan said the mixture of good and bad was remarkable. There were highclass buildings and services, and then poor native quarters where there was even a communal water supply, everyone in a household using the same dipper.

It was estimated that one adult in 10 was walking around with active tuberculosis. The death rate was estimated at at least 150 per 1000, but Dr. Wogan considered that underestimated by 100 per cent. The Health Department had established an extensive B.C.G. campaign and was doing a little mass radiography, but its future problem remained tremendous.