INFLUENZA IN BRITAIN

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXX, Issue 21423, 22 February 1933, Page 11

INFLUENZA IN BRITAIN

BELIEVED TO BE DECLINING PRECAUTIONS IN DOMINION [BY TELEGRAPH —SPECIAL REPORTER] WELLINGTON, Tuesday Although the epidemic of influenza in Britain has given no cause for alarm, the Department of Health has lately been in touch with hospital boards in order to provide a skeleton organisation in event of any emergency arising through an untoward outbreak of influenza during the coming winter. "As a further precaution," said the Minister of Health, the Hon. J. A. Young, this evening, "all port health officers have been instructed to keep a vigilant watch on passengers arriving from overseas, and particularly to scrutinise any case showing the least sign of temperature." The Minister said that whon reports of an outbreak in England were published in the newspapers, the department had not been greatly concerned, in view of the fact that the weekly cablegram forwarded through the High Commissioner from the British health authorities made no reference to the position in England. It was assumed that the trouble was no more than a seasonal outbreak of colds and pneumonia; perhaps a little more serious than usual. However, for his personal satisfaction, Mr. Young communicated direct with Sir George Newman, permanent head of the Ministry of Health in Great Britain, asking for information. In his reply, Sir George stated that while the disease was widely spread, its virulence was not unusually high. Jts prevailing form was a three to four-day period of temperature, with pain in the back and limbs. Catarrh was sometimes associated, but gastric symptoms were less frequent. In spite of an increase in deaths, the disease was not of Unusual severity in type, and the age incidence of death was for the most part that of normal distribution. The reply makes it clear that the epidemic has been regarded in official quarters in England as serious, but not alarming, and it is slated now to be probably declining. Considered on a population basis, it is actually less serious than the outbreak which New Zealand experienced during the winter of 1929.