AIDING THE CHINESE

Dominion, Volume 31, Issue 6, 2 October 1937, Page 13

AIDING THE CHINESE

Mission Hospital System

L.M.S. CONFERENCE An outline of the hospital system in China and of the work being done by the London Missionary Society at its missions in China was given by Miss A. R. Edmanson in an address at a conference of the society -which was opened in Wellington last night. There Is to be a further meeting this afternoon and a public meeting to-night-At this afternoon’s meeting the speaker will be the Rev, A. E. Small, who is stationed at Shanghai, and both Miss Edmanson, who is engaged in missionary work in Tientsin, and Mr. Small will give addresses at the public meeting. The London Missionary Society has four large city hospitals in China, Miss Edmanson told the conference last night, there being one each at Tientsin, Shanghai, Hankow, and Hong-Kong. Giving a description of the hospital at Tientsin, she stated that in that city there were as many people as in the whole of New Zealand. The hospital was similar in appearance and function to the Wellington Lewisham Hospital, but the work it did could better be compared with that of the Public Hospital. . . It was managed by a committee ot the city’s business men, and the British Consul was always the chairman of the committee. The McKenzie Hospital as the Tientsin institution was .named, had been established for 57 years, and was the best hospital available. It was entirely free from any political association and enjoyed the protection of the French concession. From 800 to 500 Chinese were treated in the out-patients’ department every Referring to another smaller hospital maintained by the mission in the country town of Siaochang, in Northern China, Miss Edmanson said that conditions there were very different. The hospital was the only one in the district, which had a population or 5,000,000. There were no Government hospitals or doctors in the district, but there were a few Chinese healers. The Chinese were patient sufferers, said Miss Edinason. Tuberculosis was a common disease, and the people also suffered from various eye diseases. That was partly due to the long hours they worked, and partly due to the fact that they often slept in the same places as they worked. It was for these people that the hospitals had been established. Excellent results were obtained, and it was estimated that fully half of the patients treated for opium smoking were cured. There was still a great necessity for improvement in the maternity services provided. At the conclusion of the address, the conference broke up into discussion groups to consider whether missionary nurses or doctors should give preference to healing or preaching; whether treatment in mission hospitals should be given free, and if not would the charging of fees have an ill-effect upon the preaching; whether it was taking an unfair advantage of a sick man’s stay in hospital to preach the Gospel to him. The conference decided in answer to the first question that, healing being a specific calling of the doctor or nurse, should be given preference, though the two weut hand in hand. The answer to all the other questions was in the negative.

The meeting spent a period in devotions, conducted by Pastor John Gilkison.