HIGH STEPPERS!

NZ Truth, Issue 406, 5 April 1913, Page 6

HIGH STEPPERS!

Dangers of the Trams. Menaces to Maternity. > A Matter for Medical Men to Move In. ! It is certainly melancholy to think how little regard is really devoted to | the matter of keeping alive 'and healthy not only the children of ours who are born, but more especially those who are about to be born. The country or city which recognises its responsibilities to the unborn babe first fulfils "its obligations to the babe's mother, and receives the, recognition of the world as being m the van of civilisation. A case m point,, where Wellington's disregard, or perhaps it^is ignorance of its obligations, to the maternal section of its ., community, has been manifest daily/' for on the Corporation trains. - In connection with the matter, , a well-known '-.:...■ "AND REPUTABLE NURSE stated to "Truth" that m the course of - her extensive midwifery practice, she experienced an alarmingly large percentage of premature births m connection with her services to patients. Directly or indirectly, these premature births are, m the majority of cases, due to overstrain by her .ascending or descending the hi'ghiSide-step o£ < the,-avera'ge Weilington^.tramvx: i,u;i .vj;-:.\i..i; .:.,-. .■;■. ■-„.. The ! -assei?fcion is quite feasible when ' one takes «into? consideration ; the fact that of. the ninety-one cars running m this city, eighteen or nineteen have the -side step fixed at a height of twelve inches from the leVel of the

roadway, whilst on the remaining sixty-two trams there are , from eighteen to eighteen and a half inches of daylight between the step and terra-firnia. To these figures may be added, say, five or six inches as the 'average undulations of the roadway and "cant' 1 on the different curves. Therefore, from the step to the ground, or vice- versa, passengers are required, m many instances, to negotiate a couple of feet or .so of intervening atmosphere as best they caii. To the average young man, no doubt, vthis; act *i 8 vas, simple as plucking 'a flower hi the garden. But to a woman — a Woman about to become a mo therrrsuch undue agitation and exertion is dangerous. . IT IS COMMON KNOWLEDGE that premature birth through mishap is even more dangerous to both mother and child than is the acti v o function of cMld-bearing. To endanger the function of maternity, then, is synonymous to endangering the life of the race. The aged maio and fenmle also suffer severely, to say nothing of' fashionably-dressed ladies who are handicapped m tho gymnastic feat of entering a Wellington tram car by their tube or hobble skirts. There spoms to be some doubt as to whether the new tramway regulations provide a remedy for the ; matter ; not that "Truth" wishes to j make the present Council the scapegoat of tho sins or omissions which mig-hfc reasonably lie at the door of some other family, of City Fathers than theirs. Possibly the community at large, who are the direct sufferers, share the responsibility more than any Council, if .only for having raised a feeble voice m protest. With the municipal elections pending, however, and the. administration of the tramway system one of the roost fundamental matters for civic dissection, there will be ample opportunity for prospective councillors to temporarily pigeon-hole a few of our present derelect trarhway reforms, and, by considering the health, and, m fact, the lives of Wellington's womenfolk, incidentally exercise tho function of uplifting and increasing the life of the com'iiiß-, as. well as the present, generation of Wellingtonians. This is a matter which the medical fraternity might very well give publicity to, m tho interests of the city's* birth-rate. A petition signed by 200 humanitarians was presented to the City Council this week praying for a remedy of this evij, hut boyonrl .sending tho petition on to the Tramway Board for consideration nothing was done.