COOK ISLANDS

Northern Advocate, 5 February 1926, Page 7

COOK ISLANDS

A MEDICAL SURVEY. REPORT nr dk. S. M. LAMBERT. I Dr S. M. Lambert, a medical expert on tropical diseases, and representative, of the Rockefeller Foundation in the Pacific Islands, who recently arrived in Wellington from Raratonga, has from time to time made health surveys of the native inhabitants of practically all of the island groups, and is thus in a better position to speak on the condition of the islanders than any other medical authority. Representing as he does an independent institution like the Rockefeller Foundation, his judgment is of special value, being quite free from national or administrative considerations. He furnished last year a valuable report on the health of the natives of Samoa, and has just completed a survey of the health of the natives in the Cook Island group, extending over about six weeks. I “I found,” said Dr. Lambert, to a ‘‘Post” reporter, “that in general the health of the natives of the Cook Islands has been well maintained.. In almost every island in the Lower Cook Group the decline in the numbers of the population has been checked, and they are now on the up-grade. The natives seem to be happy, contented, and prosperous. They are quite well satisfied with the New. Zealand administration. ” • E “There always , will be some trouble | with the medical department and with the administration of the Cook Islands,” added Dr. Lambert, “as long as-a few ‘whites’ on the beach stir up trouble. Since 1910 some of these white people have created in the minds of the Rarotongans an undue sense of their own importance. This is a serious matter, especially so far as the medical department is concerned, and as long as the present situation continues you can never have a decent medical service in the island of Rarotonga. If the best qualified man in the world were to land in Rarotonga to-day as medical officer, he would within a few weeks have complaints made against him of neglect of duty. The medical administration of the Cook Islands, as in other similar island groups in the Pacific, is a complex matter There are small populations on scattered islands. “The only solution of the difficulty is to educate the natives in medicine on the pattern of the Fijian native medical practitioner. I have had one of these native practitioners as my assistant for the last three and a-half years in these islands, and I have found his services invaluable, even in a scientific way. He is a native of Fiji named Malakai Yei Samasama. “I saw all the natives of Aitutakl, in the Lower Cook Group, 1300 in number, and examined them for manifestdisease. At Atiu Island I inspected over 95 per cent of the population. An inspection was made of all the people of Mitiaro and Mauke. On Mangaia I saw about 3000. My judgment as to the health of the natives is based on this experience. On the first day I looked them over for manifest conditions of yaws, hookworm, elephantiasis and clinical tuberculosis. Those who had anything the matter with them spoke to me about their trouble. Next day I made a careful clinical examination of these cases, and as a result ,of that examination I can say that the health of the Cook Islanders compares very favourably indeed with that of the natives, of any of. the other Pacific Island groups. First and second yaws has been almost eliminated, and what is known as third yaws is not contagious. In another year yaws ought to he coinpletely wiped out as a contagious disease.. “ Hookworm infection seems to vary on the islands. Strangely enough, Mangaia, the southernmost island, seems to have the heaviest percentage of infection, although I believe that Aitutaki, especially amongst young children, has also a marked infection. There is enough infection all through the group to warrant mass treatment of the population in the same way in which it has been carried out at Samoa. “ I understand that in continuation of the policy of the New Zealand Government to concentrate all leper patients for modem treatment at the wonderfully equipped leper sation at Makogai Island, Fiji, a Government steamer will this year visit all the islands of the Cook group for the purpose of collecting the leper patients, numbering over thirty, and take them to the leper settlement. “ The time has come when the authorities of the various groups of the Pacific Islands should cease to regard them as separate entities in many respects. We should look on all these islands as being one medical picture, at any rate. What each separate group may find it impossible to do separately will he possible of achievement by combination. The united policy being now carried out in respect to leprosy is a notable illustration of this. The proposed training, school for native medical administration is another excellent suggestion, and such a policy might with great advantage be carried out in education and in other departments. "Outside of the island of Rarotonga,” 'remarked Dr. Lambert, “I did not hear anything but good of the Cook Island administration.”