IN THE WAIKATO

Evening Post, Volume LXXXVI, Issue 53, 30 August 1913, Page 6

IN THE WAIKATO

STRONG COMMENT REGARDING I STATE OF THINGS. I (BY TELEGBAIVK — PRESS ASSOCIATION.) HAMILTON, his Day. Strong comments were made at the Hamilton Borough Council on the attitude of the Health Department with regard to smallpox. The Mayor stated that a deputation of Natives had waited on him yesterday, appealing for medical assistance. H© had sent to the pas, where there was much illness, apart from smallpox. Medical men were refusing to visit camps, which were also sorely in want of sustenance, some of the kaingas being on the verge of starvation. The Natives had no food, and no money, and were being prohibited to leave the camps. They had no means of earning any. The Health Department, said the Mayor, had taken the administration of the health laws out of the- hands of the local bodies, but immediately it had struck trouble it had shirked its responsibilities. It was impossible for the local inspector to supervise all the camps in the Waikato, which were very scattered, and stretched over a wide area. The consequence was that Natives wandered. The deputation which had called at his office was from a badly-infected camp. The attitude of the Department all through, he said, rivalled a Gilbert and Sullivan opera. It was decided to send a strong protest to the Minister, demanding more stringent measures to wipe out the disease in the Waik&to, and more Btrict supervision of the movements of Natives and attention to their wants.