Medical Conference.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XL, Issue 7790, 15 March 1904, Page 6

Medical Conference.

j (Per Press Association^. WELLINGTON, Maroh 14 ! The annual meeting of the New Zealand 'branch of tho British Medical Association, which opened this evening, was attended by medical men from all parts of the colony. The President, Dr. Collins, of Wellington, delivered a long address in which he touched on several matters of public interest. He con-' gratulated the Government Health Department upon the prompt and effective manner in which it had resisted the invasida of tile colony by plague and small-pox, and commended the erection of a sanitorium at Cambridge for tlie treatment of consumptives. The maintenance" of the high standard of public health was urged did lessons in elementaiy health to the school children was recommended as a duty, particularly as such instruction would lead..to tho 'acquirement of knowledge which would' assist in the arrest or prevention of many diseases which are now rife. In regard to the birth rate 'Dr. Collins said there seems to be no doubt that if effort is not made to divert the inclinations of the people from unwholesome channels, the sacrcdness of the marriage tie will _c .Jeopardised, _nd the very existence of trie race threatened. "It is a matter," he continued, "which requires tlie earnest consideration of both men and women. So soon as people begin to consider their own fel fish needs to tho exclusion or the wcl'l-bolng oil tlie community, it follows that in the end •the race must surely suffer. Interference with functions that arc natural to the body must produce deterioration and disease—such dread diseases as melancholia, and other forms of mental disease, and cancer.