DRIVE AWAY INFLUENZA.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 20538, 12 April 1930, Page 7 (Supplement)

DRIVE AWAY INFLUENZA.

(By a Doctor.)

Tho natural tendency for medical research workers is always to hunt for a causo and a cure. Indeed, tho rejoicing over a discovered causa is, of course, duo to tho hopes, well founded enough, that the discovery of tho causo of a disease will bo followed by tho production of its cure.

Much better than either is to discover ways to prevent tho disease from ever attacking tho human body. This should be our ideal, and we should bo fortified in the hope of achieving it by remembering tho words of tho great Pasteur. It was ho who said: " The germ is nothing; tho soil is everything."

Now tho soil is in our own hands. We have only to till it successfully and no diseaso gerrn will ever flourish on it. In other words, if wo keep ourselves fit enough neither influenza nor any other diseaso can bring us down. Whether the germ of influenza has been found or not, l"fc us see to it that in our own bodies, at anv rate, it can never take a hold. Some' fresh air daily, some bodily exercise dailv, moderation in food and rink, and meals of a simple nutritious character —these are the main safeguards.

Fortified by a quiet mind, which busies itself intently on whatever it is concerned with, the bodies thus simply sustained will not yield readily to the attack of influenza or of any other germ.

When an epidemic of influenza is actually in being, then the extra precaution should be taken of especial caro of the portals through which the germ enters. Tho mouth and nose, should no gently irrigated night and morning with a simple solution of sugar and salt and water.