HUMAN WASTAGE

New Zealand Times, Volume XLIII, Issue 10138, 28 November 1918, Page 4

HUMAN WASTAGE

LIFE AMD LABOUR IN THE SLUMS DREAD TOLL TAKEN BY POVERTY. DIRT AND DISEASE. “One half the world does not know how the other half lives.” This is an old maxim, and its truth is apparent in Wellington to-day. The influenza . epidemic has brought home to citizens the fact that a community cannot afford to let the unholy trinity of poverty, disease and dirt run riot in their midst, . Poverty, whatever its value may he as a disciplinary force aniongst the fit, is a social evil of the first magnitudearid one that any community that tolerates it pays dearlv for. Poverty is the root cause of the slum. It is not the house or the street that makes a slum,, but the people who live in it. So that tfie problem faced by the Empire City is not only how to abolish the slum, but how to remove the causes that 20 to the creation of a slum population.' ' ' A tour round some of the slum areas of Wellington yesterday gave a “Times” representative an idea of the depth of poverty in which the “submerged tenth” of the city live. Ip some cases it has reached utter destitution. Infants have been found by the epidemic fighters lacking any clothing at all. Women stricken by the influenza wore found destitute of nightclothes. Women deprived 'of their breadwinners are left to struggle along with children, with no means of paying the rent, and in some cases with the prospect sooner or later of having another mouth to feed. One such case is that of a woman 21 years of age, occupying a house belonging to ■an estate administered hr the Public Trustee. She has two children,’ and is expecting another. She owes five l weeksrent, and is being “dunned’” for it." Some official or other, having the official mind, called on her and suggested that she might he able to secure employment! Meantime she is dependent on public and private relief. But the rent has not been paid. What is to become of her? What chance have the children? Can the Dominion allow potential citizens to • grow up during . their most plastic years ini conditions that do not make for a sound mind and' a sound body? These questions seem to demand an immediate answer, for it is certain that, sheer, stark poverty is undermining the physique of many of Wellington’s wage-earners. Poverty means a low standard of health, a low standard of living, and a low moral.- Enervated by disease, the submerged tenth lose hope, and as they see themselves getting deeper into the mire they, grow hopeless. .They j lab themselves, driftodown the stream!! Many such are being helped by the nurses and helpers now engaged in curing and preventing the spread of the epidemic. As a specimen may be mentioned the case of two single women living in a hovel at the topof a certain street. The house was occupied , by a family consisting of the two women and their father. The latter has been sent to hospital. The .place has an uninviting ..aspect .ifrPfflUhft sfreet, 3 and although : it„had.hcen.^terid£H iC tot by the sanitary workers, an evil smell himg round it. The paper on the walls had been taken off. There was next to no furniture. On two stretchers lay .the., two . women. One of them, aged 23, looked more Hke 50. Her limbs were terribl- emaciated, and her hands were so twisted up that they looked like claws. The women were helpless wrecks, weak in mind and body, pitiful derelicts drifting on the sea of ~ life-. Such human wastage yeprqsoqts, a positive danger to the community. Ordinary sanitary precautions would avail little in such a case. Their social freedom is a menace to the public health. Some kind of home is the only possible place for them till death mercifully releases them from their suffering. The general opinion of workers who hare had some experience in slum work at Home is that the Wellington slum is equal to the worst they have seen. The people welcome the tisit of the sanitary volunteers ay’ 'a' Viile, a 1 frequent greeting being, “Thank God you have come.” .