"NOTIFIABLE"

Evening Post, Volume LXXXVII, Issue 119, 21 May 1914, Page 8

"NOTIFIABLE"

VENEREAL DISEASE RECOMMENDATIONS OF , MEDICAL CONGRESS. The recommendations of the Special Committee of the Australasian Medical Congress, held in Auckland in February last, on tho subject of syphilis, were this afternoon submitted to the Wellington Hospital and Charitable Aid Board' for consideration. In a covering letter, forwarding the committee's report, Dr. Valintine, In-spector-General of -Hospitals, said :— "I feel. sure that your .board will do all that it is possible to give effect to the recommendations, especially recommendations 2 and 3. As regards the free treatment in our public hospitals, recommended by the committee, I would suggest that such free treatment particularly apply in the out-patient department of our hospitals, but that where possible a fee, according to the patients' means, be charged to syphilitic persons who have to be treatd as in-patients. The department is taking the necessary steps to give effect to the other recommendations of the Special Committee." The following are the recommendations | of the Special Committee of the Australasian Medical Congress : — "(1) That syphilis be declared a notifiable disease. i That notification be encouraged and discretionary, but not compulsory : and that the Chief Medical Officer of Health be the only person to whom the notification be made. (2) That provision be made through the hospital boards to establish laboratories in the four centres where not already existent for the diagnosis of syphilis. (3) That free treatment in the public hospitals and dispensaries be provided for syphilitics. (4 ; That steps be taken to educate the mercan tile marine as to the dangers of | syphilis, and that provision be made \for preventive treatment on thd intercolonial service. (5) That legislation be enacted against the treatment of syphilitics by unqualified persons. (Signed) William E. Collins (chairman)." The Medical Superintendent of the Wellington Hospital, Dr. Hardwick Smith, submitted a report on the whole question, in which he said that the fol lowing suggestions might be useful: — 1. That lectures be given by the medical profession, for they are (he best authorities in these diseases. 2. That all institutions, such as schools, universities, young men and women's associations, etc., have a course of lectures dealing with these diseases. 3. That the De-/ fence Forces, when in camp, attend lectures on these subjects. 4. That ships' surgeons be given a gVant to lecture to the officers and men on their ships. 5. That public bodies, such as the hospital boards, give grants to medical men to give public lectures, duly advertised, to young men and women. j Dr. Hardwick Smith, in his report, said: — "If those suggestions were carried out, especially in the Defence Forces, then most of the young of New Zealand would have a knowledge of these diseases, and feel their responsibility, i both to themselves and to their fellow men and wcjinen, to a greater extent than they -do at present. The time hag gone by when it was^ thought that the panacea for these ilia was legalised vice. Legalised vice nev^r did good and never will do good, and At a the present time it is not necessary to discuss it. The CD. Act and similar Acts, I hope, have been relegated to the past. Veneieal disease should be classed under the heading of infectious diseases. Greater facilities must in future b° granted at the Public Hospital for the treatment of these cases. Thanks to the press, who have printed in their columns^ much about these subjects lately, patients have come up for treatment in much greater numbers." In concluding his report, Dr Hardwick "Smith said : "I feel sure that if some of '-the proposals I have brought down are carried out by this board, then mankind will be benefited exceedingly, and venereal _ disease wjll be greatly lessened. Immorality, and with it these diseases, will ever be with us till such time as education has^ taught us_ self-restraint, love of home ties and family, and society becomes so altered that the young may marry young."