OUR BABIES.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVII, 16 June 1928, Page 17

OUR BABIES.

BY HYGEIA

Published under the auspices 0 f the Royal New Zealand Society for the Health of Women and Children (Pluuket Society).

COLDS AND CATCHING COLDS. Having lately been asked to> deal with the matter or babies'. coicis and then prevention, we snail quote uom , severe, articles widen appeared, in these celunnis some years ago. They are specially appropriate just now, wnen winter is approaching fast. We are tree oi immediate anxiety with regard to l’liantue diarrhoea, but now begins the season wnen we find bames atl over the country surlemiig trom coughs and colds, sore throats, hroncnitis, and pneumonia. “lhei.se diseases puli them down, damage, their whole breathing apparatus-, give them auenoiais, prevent the proper development or their chests, and tend to make them catch cold again and again throughout- childhood ana a,r ter wan Is.

‘ ‘Tills appears to be the most serious side of the matter—the damaging and weakening ox the- whole organism, through lack of a little forethought ana common sense on the part of parents and their failure to get a grip of what is necessary in the way of prevention.

HIGH WINTER DEATH-RATE. “Rut there is another side to the question of letting 'infants, catch colds, namely, the large share which it plays in -piling up the death-rate, 'turn to tlie annual statistics of any country, anu you will find tnat, while children (lie oi diarrhoea in summer, they mostly die trout colds and chest attentions in winter, and it should always he borne in mind that a very large number of those who do not actually succumb in infancy through catching colds fall a prey bue on to tuberculosis. “All this miserable train of evils would be avoided if parents could only be brought to realise that prevention is easily achieved, and that it can be achieved in one way only, namely, by giving every child its natural rights oi abundance of pure, cool, fresh air, plenty of exercise, and outing in the open air and -sunlight, avoidance of coddling in warm stuffy rooms at any time, avoidance of excessive clothing. It is difficult to school oneself to speak with patience on these matters. “Daily one sees little children taken from warm beds in warm kitchens (where- they never ought to be) out into the open air with Ware arms, bare legs, and totally insufficient wrappings —and, then the mother, finding that her baby catches cold, blames Providence or the cold, pure air lor tne results of her own -stupidity. Again, look at the children -placed in draughts on the floor, or just inside an open door-; way, or, Averse still, propped up on a pillow in front of tile fire just after a warm bath to ‘toast the- toes, as shown and described! on page 67 ‘Feeding and Care of Balby.’

COMMON COiLDS: SHOULD THEY BE COMMON !- “Common colas are generally regarded as mysterious, accidental, and more or less unavoidable- visitations of Providence. In reality they are not so. They are- no- more mysterious or inevitable than constipation or diarrhoea, and they -are precisely analogous to sueli fevers as pneumonia, pleurisy, measles, or typhoid fever. “Common colds are not merely like fevers; they are actually fevers. They are -always due to an invasion of the body by millions of microbes, which breed with amazing rapidity in the nose and upper -air passages, and quickly poison the -blood and eifect more or less g very t/i&s'uo of t-iiG foody } oa using t-liti victim to feel hot and cold by turns, fevered, thirsty, and -gore, sick, dull, languid, and miserable. “Hostile microbes are always liable to ibe lurking about the mouth, nose, and throat, and if someone introduces a specially virulent strain of germ-s into a home it i.s apt to make a successful campaign against the whole household, if the family happens to live under conditions which render the tissues of t-heir bodies feeble fighters in general and specially inefficient to comibiat this particular class of organism. In other words, if they happen to he people who habitually live in warm, stuffy rooms, fail to fortify their bodies daily by cola sponging or battling, followed by rubbin" and active excrc-ise, and whodo not* avail themselves of the healthy, vitalising of open air and st*nlight. , . .... “Parents could keep their children throng and almost- proof against disease if they wonlkl on-ly conform to the simplest -primary laws and needs o.t healthy living -set down -as What Every Baby Needs’ on pages 1 and 2 at tne Society 7 ’s book ‘Feeding and Care oi Baby,’ and amplified so many times in these columns. But, unhappily, theie are people yvho v r on’t take the trouble—— won’t take any trouble —until the baby i.s ill; then, too 'l-a.te. they are -ready to spend or to do anything in order to cure what could so easily have been prevented. -