HEALTH HATTERS

Gisborne Times, Volume VI, Issue 273, 27 November 1901, Page 2

HEALTH HATTERS

MEDICAL CONFERENCE, SCARLET FEVER EPIDEMIC, (Special to Trap-- \

. Wellington, last night. Mason, Chief Health Officer, will represent Government at the Intercolonial Medical Conference to be held at Hobart in February next. The treatment of cancer is one of the most important topics of debate. The Health Department officers report that a mild epidemic of scarlet fever prevails in most parts of the colony at the present time, the patients being mostly children. The. disease is being spread because parents fail to recognise their responsibility in matters affecting the public health. This is no doubt mostly due to ignorance. For instance a woman here found some of her children had broken out into rash. No medical advice was sought, and no precautions taken. When, finally, her children began to cast their.skin, a local chemist was consulted, and so the matter came to the ears of the Health Officer, who took prompt measures, but in the meantime the disease may have been communicated to half-a-dozen other families.

The Department complains that local authorities have not appreciated their responsibilities, probably because many of them have not made themselves acquainted with their duties under the Public Health Act. They are supposed to undertake the fumigation of all houses in which infected diseases have occurred, and those failing in this duty will probably some day find themselves threatened with penalties for neglect of what is now a stringent law.