AUSTRALIAN YOUTHS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIV, Issue 19833, 31 December 1927, Page 12

AUSTRALIAN YOUTHS.

THE, FIT AND THE UNFIT. TWO CONFLICTING STATEMENTS. [FROM OCR. OWN CORRESPONDENT.] SYDNEY, Dec. 22. Those who heard Dr. Harvey Sutton, medical officer of the New South Wales Education Department, declare in a lecture last week that a race of supermen was slowly evolving, now find themselves confronted with the statement that more than 30 per cent, of Australian youths who pass the medical examination for the Citizen Forces, and more than 25 per cent, of those examined for the senior cadets, are unfit. It seems hard to reconcile the two statements. The official explanation of the increase of physical unfitness among youths called up for compulsory service is that increased height and chest measurement standards have been adopted. This, however, does not explain the high percentage of unfit among boys examined for the senior cadets. Furthermore, the percentages of unfit aro steadily increasing. Of the 20,000 youths examined for the Citizen Forces in 1924, 17 per cent, had to stand down because they were too narrow-chested, or for some other reason. The following vear 32 per cent, of 20,000 were unfit. In 1926, with a similar number of candidates, the percentage of unfit had reached 33, and this year, although the number examined. 18,476, was less, the unfit totalled a little more than 30 per cent.