TROPICAL HYGIENE

King Country Chronicle, Volume XXVII, Issue 4397, 25 May 1933, Page 2

TROPICAL HYGIENE

AUSTRALIA'S PROBLEM.

ABOLITION OF RESEARCH. Sydney, May 11. Medical men in Australia are concerned about the effects on the national reputation which might'arise from the abolition by the Commonwealth Government of the Division of Tropical Hygiene. It is feared that might be taken by other nations as an indication that Australia is no lonyer interested in that portion of the Commonwealth which lies in the tropics, and for that reason efforts are being made to induce the Government to set aside a sum of money that would ensure a reopening of the division. The division, which is part of the Health Department, was closed as an economy move, and some assert that it was false economy, for a great deal had been done to make the tropical area safe for white habitation.

Tropical hygiene is closely associated with the question of white settlement in countries formerly regarded as unsuitable for colonisatio'n by Europeans. In Australia, hookworm, denge fever, malaria, environment, housing and dress of whites have all been the subjects of study. Whereas the natives escape many of the tropical diseases, the white man, born and bred in an atmosphere of preventive medicine, has not acquired natural immunity, and it has been shown that the simple children of Nature can teach many lessons.

In 1922 it was found that more than 62,000 people in Northern Australia were infected with hookworm, and so serious had the disease become that a great campaign was waged to stamp it out. In this fight the Queensland

Government, the Commonwealth Government and the Rockefeller Foundation co-operated, and because of the preventive steps taken, and because the dangers of polluted soil were impressed upon the people, hookworm disease is now being brought under control. Tropical hygiene is concerned not only with the control of disease but with the life and labour of the white man in the tropics, and in this direction there is still a great deal of work to be done. When there is such a demand that Australia should populate the tropical areas, or give them over to some nation prepared to do so, it seems a pity that there should be any slackening of the good work that was started 12 years ago.

Tropical Australia is singularly free from many of the diseases that infect tropical areas in other parts of the world, but there is still ample scope for research by men who have the necessary training. It is scarcely satisfactory to read an official explanation that portions of the work already started are being carried on by the other sections of the Health Department, for tropical hygiene is a highly specialised study. The British Medical Association is in the forefront of the fight to have the division restored.