THE PUBLIC HEALTH.

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume I, Issue 63, 24 February 1911, Page 11

THE PUBLIC HEALTH.

(To the Editor.)

Sir, —A cable message from Sydney a few days ago stated a pro-

posal was made by the Labour Conference to nationalize the Health Administration. There is no question agitating men’s minds to-day of more vital importance to our race than the question of Public Health, before one can do anything really worth while, either for himself or the public it is above all things necessary that good health should be enjoyed.

There never was a time in the history of our race and nation when we needed good health more than we do at the present. The problems to be faced and solved during the next few years are momentous, and upon their satisfactory solution our further existence as an Empire depends. We are even now being weighed in the balances.

The question of public health is one which should rightly be undertaken by the Government. There should be a Department of Public Health. There is something of that sort in name now. I believe, dominated by the doctors but it confines itself in a tired, don’t care sort of

way to such matte.-s as sanitation, and acts as a stumbling block generally to the spread of enlightened views in the matter of public health.

; fp to the present our statesmen (sic) have had too great a part of their valuable time taken up in dealing with the question of building ornamental post offices, sites

for theatres and discussing their private affairs, so that no time was left to deal with the people’s health.

■ The average man to-day is think- ! ing as he nevei' thought before; he 'is bent upon solving questions for t himself. Of what use is oui' educa- ; cation, our science, and learning if . it does not teach us to build the highest form of life from the materia! used ? Thinking minds are . realising that most people do not • enjoy good health and as a conse- ' quence do not get half the enjoyment out of life they should do. They want to know the reason why.

i The forces engaged in solving' this problem are the thinking , minds of all nations, and if I read 'the signs of the times aright the next decade will stand out in history as owe of the most important since the world began. It will have ses in motion a current of thought on the subject of human health that will only end in reforms full of good for mankind and of tar greater value than all the learning of the musty centuries that have gone before. The average for death with, mankind is. 1 believe, 40 years or thereabouts. We die in our youth, because of our own wrong-doing. Scientists consider that animals should live eight times as long as it takes them to reach maturity; man reaches maturity at about the

age of 24, eight times that gives us nearly 200 years as the limit of man’s age. Nowadays, nobody reaches that age. The oldest Englishman we have any record of is Old Jenkins. He was a farmer who died at the age of 169. His life was a very even one, no great excitement, but a calm, jog-along existence.

The Arabs are a long-lived race. They live the natural, simple outdoor life. Almost all sickness anc ill-health are the results chiefly of our breaking nature’s laws. The laws of health are, after all, very simple, and if they are followed a great deal more enjoyment can be got out of life than most people are aware of. We are as gods in that we have the knowledge of good and evil, and because we follow the evil ways instead of the good we do not live out half our days.

The doctor of the future will be a Government official. A man who will have made a study of health and the means of getting it (doctors in the past have studied diseases). He will tell people how they should live, what is best for them to eat, and such like, and we shall be ready to take notice of him because we shall know that he is interested in our getting well. If one went to a doctor now and asked for adivce on the question of food he would most probably tell you to eat what agreed with you,

and then if you asked what should agree with you he would most probably say: “You should know best what agrees with you.” The doctor does not make his money out of health, so he has not given it that : attention and study he has given Jto disease—-that’s his paying line, j The methods of the drug and j operation doctors are being quesl tioned to-day as never before, and j reform movements are in progress lin many lands. Those interested : in maintaining the system will try to justify its existence, but they will fail, it will perish, it will pass away. The theory of curing I disease with drugs and operations lis wrong. It is wrong because because it is opposite to and in violation of every natural law geoverning animal life. Disease and illhealth come in accordance with the laws of nature and in accordance with the laws of nature they will go away—be cared. The drug and operation, theory consists in giving sick people the things and doing to them that Which .would ill-health and disease in 'people who are well . I Sickness is merely an expression or sympton given you by the body of some form of congestion or poisoning. It is utterly absurd to think that this condition can be removed or cured by introducing [into the body any kind of drugs and especially poison, or jby unnatural, violent and danger-

ous operations. Sickness can only be cured by removing its causes, by employing as remedies for sick persons those things which preserve health in well persons. These are not theories but nature’s laws, fundamental, infallible, unanswerable.

The medical profession is a noble one and its opportunities for doing good are boundless. I don’t know of any work more praiseworthy than that of assisting nature -to cure the sick and studying the laws of health for the benefit of others. Whilst I admire the profession, I can’t close my eyes to the fact that its methods are antiquated—long out of date. It is the only profession that has made practically no advance, because for the most part the members of the profession spend years studying useless writings of old doctors and thereby perpetuate their mistakes, instead of studying nature. I mean to make one of my boys a doctor, but it will be of hygeinic methods he will have to study. I would not spend a penny on his study of the drug and operation methods of dealing with disease because I am certain that that system ' is productive of vastly more evil than good. The medical must be nationalised just as the teaching profession was. We can’t expect doctors to study and help to bring about reform in health matters that will, when carried to their

logical conclusion, banish illhealth. The people must be educated how to maintain their own health. This would, of course, seriously interfere with the doctor’s business—a business which thrives upon disease instead of health — a business that is most prosperous when most people suffer—a business conducted by private individuals who, if they were to keep the people healthy would impoverish themselves—a business that is supported by exactly the opposite conditions that all good people desire.

■Dr. Nicholls, in Esoteric Anthropology, says : ‘ are interested in disease as soldiers are in war and lawyers in quarrels. It is not the interests of doctors to study health but disease. It is not their interest to preserve the health of the public—their living depends upon the contrary condition. If doctors were paid in proportion to the health id the and their income# were oimimshed 'by every epidemic and every case of disease, we should stand in le-ss need of sanitary legislation. As it is, it is not for the interest of any physician that any individual should remain free from sickness or that he should recover rapidly, every day the case is expedited takes money out of his pockets and bread out of the mouths of his fam ily.” We know that doctors are bul human, and are in their business like any other professional man for what they can make or get, and it is not to be expected that thej will spend their time in studying out simple means of curing disease or keeping people in healtl for that would mean putting them selves out of business. Health and education, physical and mental upliftment go hand ir hand; they are things that can bt controlled by the people for they appeal to and interest all alike, and are too vital to everyone to permil of inefficiency or worse. Progress in the educational world is novi measured from the distance we have travelled from the fee sys-tem—-the system on which .the medical profession still operates. When the public mind is thoroughly roused to the great benefits to be obtained by a Public De- | partment of Health it will become one of the most popular political cries of the day, such a movement will meet with no resistance except from those who thrive upon the impaired health of the people. Such a department would be another step forward and add to the long list of reforms pioneered in “God’s Own Country.” 1 The Department of Health must take the health of the people in hand, the health of the people must be the first law. All the doctors needed must be employed by the Government like the schoolmasters, and appointed to districts. It must be the . doctors’ duty to see that their districts are in good sanitary condition, and the people in good health. When it is to the doctor’s interest to see all people enjoying good health, them they will tell people how to live properly, as regards food, air. exercise, bathing, drink, smoking, and what habits are good and what are bad, and when the people do live properly, the doctor will have plenty of time to spare, and then his chance for doing further good will come. Instead of experimenting at the peril of his patient, with deadly drugs and operations, he .will have time to study thoroughly the action of various foods, the best mode of cooking, or as some are now advising—no cooking at all—-sun-cooked food, the best method of ventilation, the best way to dress for health, and lots of other things that make for health and long life. There are many earnest men in. the medical profession who accept these ideas and who do not rely on the use of drugs or operations to help in the cure of diseases. The doctor with the largest and most successful —successful from a curing point of view. I have often heard’ of operations being successful —that the patient had not enough vitality to recover from) in London to-day use® only hygienic methods with his patients. He has of late years treated over 150 cases of appendiditis in this way, not a single operation, and not a death.This is the system of treating disease the public want, but the ordinary doctor doesn’t want it, because there is not enough mystery or fees connected with it. This system will only become universal when the Government take the matter in hand. —Yours, etc., JOHN RICH. Itafoola, Havelock North, Feb. 21.