SHORT OF HOSPITALS

Greymouth Evening Star, 17 April 1937, Page 8

SHORT OF HOSPITALS

SOVIET PLEDGE TO MOTHERS. MOSCOW. March 5. The greatest increase in the birthrate in Russia, following the banning of operations for abortion under M. Stalin's “New Family Life Code." has created a serious problem. The official newspaper “Pravda” reveals to-day that the pledge to build hundreds of maternity hospitals to cope with the increase has not been fulfilled. Terrible overcrowding has resulted. “The entire plan for building maternity hospitals in 1936." the paper stales, “has been postponed until 1937. despite the Kremlin's orders. In Russia proper and Siberia accommodation for 1,100 extra beds should have been provided, but only a score or two have really been installed. “In Gorki, for instance, whore, as a result of M. Stalin's decree, the number of births has risen by between 700 and 800 a. month, a new maternity hospital with GO beds should have been opened last year, but will not be ready until next autumn. Now the Gorki Soviet proposes, as an easy way out, to Hirn children's sanatoria and kindergartens into hospitals for mothers. "That, declares 'Pravda.' is what has happened to the plan for 1936. and nobody has even thought about the plan for 1937.“ The All-Union Commissar for Health, M. Kaminsky and his Ukrainian counterpart, M. Kantorovish, must, demands, the paper, be called to account.