MOTHERS AND INFANTS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19469, 27 October 1926, Page 12

MOTHERS AND INFANTS.

The general impression given by perusal of the official reports on the Dominion's vital statistics for 1925, of which a summary was published yesterday, is favourable. The deathrate remains at an extremely low level, and though the birth-rate has again fallen to a new low record, the difference between them still leaves a rate of natural increase exceeded by few countries. Again, the outstanding fact is the achievement of a "phenomenally low" rate of infantmortality, the figure having fall.in for the first time below 4 per cent, of the year's total of living births. A welcome improvement is also evident in the statistics of maternal mortality, the rate showing a reduction for the fourth year in succession, though it is still far higher than in other countries that lead the world in this respect as New Zealand does in the safeguarding of infancy. There is, however, one phase of this statistical survey to which very little attention is paid in the official reports, and by common consent is usually ignored in authoritative discussions of 'ihe subject The Government Statistician has observed that since so much has been achieved in combating the post-natal causes of mortality, further decided improvement in the general infant death-rate must depend upon the arresting of pre-natal causes, which are fatal in the first month of life and especially in the first week. That conclusion has the support of the Dominion's infant welfare authorities, whose promotion of ante-natal care and instruction is reflected in the proceedings of the present child welfare conference. It cannot be doubted that the causes which have fatal consequences in the earliest period of life are also responsible for the mortality recorded as still-births. Yet the latter are wholly excluded from the statistics of births and deaths, and are generally ignored in any consideration of maternal and infant welfare. Their statistical importance, however, cannot bo neglected. During recent years, they have shown a "definite tendency" to increase. In 191'/, for every 1000 living births there were 48 deaths within the first year of life and 24 still-births. Since then, the infant mortality has been reduced to 40, but the rate of still-births (though lower in the last two years than in 1923) is over 30. Thus the loss through still-births is almost as serious as the loss through the actual infant mortality of the accepted definition. Presuming the accuracy of the suggestion that deaths in the first week of life are due to antenatal causes, it would appear that still-births present the graver problem, for they numbered 861 last year, as against 571 deaths of infants who did not survive a week after birth. There are probably sufficiently simple explanations of these facts, but will those who have j triumphed over the causes of infant mortality be merely content to ex-1 plain them without attempting to combat the injurious factors, as prejudicial to the mother as to the stubborn child "2