INFLUENZA EPIDEMIC

Evening Star, Issue 16990, 12 March 1919, Page 7

INFLUENZA EPIDEMIC

COMMISSION OF INQUIRY. At yesterday's sitting at Wellington of the, Influenza Commission Lieutenantcolonel Makgill said it had been suggested in_ Auckland that insanitary conditions existed, .favoring the developing of a more virulent typo of influenza, but experience had told him that conditions equally insanitary could be found in any of our main ceiitres. Moreover, catarrhal pneumonia ■was not nearly so prone in the epidemic form to take on a severe type amongst the J slum dwellers as among strong, healthy, [ young people brought up in the country. j A child brought, up in crowded conditions I in'a slum either succumbed in infancy or survived by developing increased natural lesistanoe to raicrobicinvasions. A countrybred child, no! having to face this strugglo of its body cells and phagocytes against infection, reached adult life without acquiring that natural immunity, and therefore when transported in conditions -tvhereby he met varieties of invading organisms hitherto unknown to him, fell an easy prey to the effect of inwinitation. Urban conditions could not therefore be regarded as accountable for the outburst having begun in Auckland. Whilst this ■was the oaso, the Influence of crowding and of living in dark and ill-ventilated conditions could not be overlooked. Persons among euoii surroundings undoubtedly suffered more severely, and the proportion of pneumonic cases was higher. This was exemplified in the poor-class lodginghouses and in crowded quarters. The same thing applied to milkers and shearers. Reviewing tho factors making for the severity of the influenza, outburst ijti November, the witness said it was possible in a measure to piece together the whole story. The influenzal infection found in 1918 was world-wide, climatic conditions favoring ite spread. It found gatherings of troops to exalt ita virulence, and by tho torangference of such troops about the world it wan able to reach other countries with ever-increasing infectivity. The influence of the appalling prison camps Tn Germany and Austria hadi-not been discussed, but among the starved and crowded soldiors there abnormal infections would find good breeding ground. Either in this way or simply from camps of unprotected persons ordinary influenzal virus became associated with pneumonia, producing organisms callable _of unusual potency under favorable conditions. Such conditions presented themselves in NW Zealand in climatic disturbances, unusual movements and apt- j gregations of troops, and the natural lack j of immunity of the people. The virulence ' would increase naturally as the primary epidemio spiead over the country and as successive accretions of higher virulence came from overseas.

Dr Valintin* (Inspector-general of Hospitals and Chief .Health Officer) said that when sicknes? broke out thero were only six medical _ officers to deal with an epidemic showing characteristics as regards virulence and infection never before experienced by any n nber of the profession in New Zealand. This was the position when he and Dr Makgill lesumed civil duty. The local bodies did their work well, and co-operated with the department in the establishment of temporary hospitals and other measures necessary to fight- the diseaee. Dr Valintine spoke of the need of reorganising the department. Ever since it 3 inception in 1902 the department had been starved. He had, however, no reason to blame any particular Minister of! the department for not doing his best to place it on a sounder footing. The Rev. Samuel Robertson Orr (minister of St. Andrew's Presbyterian Church) said he had been chairman of the Wellington North Epidemic Committee. He said it had seemed to him that the municipal authority should have had power to isolate houses and areas where the disease broke out first. The medical aid had been inadequate until the doctors worked on the block system.