DIET AND HEALTH

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22777, 10 July 1937, Page 19

DIET AND HEALTH

Sn-,—-1 have read with great pleasure the letter in Friday's Hkiiald, by Mr. Henry Hayward, regarding the proposed appointment of a committee to report on the proposals of the League of Nations re the above. We view withgreat concern the deaths and accidents on our highways, and spend considerable sums of money and much thought in trying to prevent these casualties and rightly so.' But taking into consideration the importance of the subject, little is clone to educate the general public in the prevention of ill-health by mearfs of correct diet and correct combinations of foods. The importance of the matter should bo apparent to every thinking citizen. We are dealing with the subject of health and ill-health from a wrong anglo altogether. We are, nearly all of us, disease-conscious instead of health-con-scious. it is rather stressing the obvious, when the letters directly abovo and below Air. .Hayward s both deal with the Hospital Board's rebuilding programme of approximately half a million pounds, and in another part of the same issue of your paper, is half a column dealing with tho statement that all hospitals, both public and private, are full. The increase in tho number of sick citizens is out of proportion to the increase in population, and yet we spend an exceedingly small amount in educating our children and our citizens in the "Art of Living." Health and how to obtain and retain it, should be a compulsory subject in our schools. iMoney should be spent more freely in propaganda in this respect. It was propaganda, in the cause of Coimnuuisty by Russia, that created such concern at the National conferences. Surely the Government and the public will give assistance to Mr. Horace Herring, M.L\ lor Mid-Can-terbury, when making his representations and encourage and authorise expenditure on propaganda for the prevention of ill-health, when New Zealand spends millions each year in the care of those suffering from disease. Unfortunately, Buffering is glorified, almost sanctified, because nearly everyone suffers. Maybe tho time will como when we shall be ashamed to be ill and then 110 doubt, we shall look for causes instead of tinkering with effects and being proud of diseases in ail its ramifications, and' of operations. In order that this desirable result may be achieved, time, money , and thought will have to bo spent as suggested, in truly educating the public in the fundamentals of right living in general, and diet in particular. . F.J.H.