T.B. War Must be Waged On National Scale.

NZ Truth, Issue 1167, 12 April 1928, Page 1

T.B. War Must be Waged On National Scale.

THE position at the Cashmere sana--1 torium, Christchurch, is acute,

and inquiries show that the public utterances at the recent meeting of the hospital board are \nore than justified m their criticisms of the Health Department. The remedy is clear. The Government must take over the whole of the T.B. campaign for the Dominion and recover the cost — if need be — from the various boards.

No other course is open if the ravages of the disease are to be checked. The boards — particularly the North Canterbury board — are up against it. From the department is expected a definite lead, and m the interests of sufferers and potential sufferers "N.Z. Truth" calls for action.

Walking about the streets of the towns and cities of the Dominion are many men and women under sentence of death, with no possible chance of the sentence being remitted. They are victims of the great white scourge — tuberculosis — condemned to die because the Government cannot, or will not, find the money to assist the hospital boards to provide adequate accommodation and treatment.

Their days are numbered. In

vain do they plead for succor. The . sanatoria, especially that at Cashmere, Christchurch, are

crowded and the waiting lists, which are growing daily, are records of tragedy and despair.

The Health Department declines to make any grant to provide increased accommodation and the North Canterbury Hospital Board is face to face with a crisis which is condemning men and women to the grave without a dog's chance of staying the disease or winning their way back to health. Serious allegations against the department were made at the last meeting of the hospital board by the chairman of the public health committee (A. T. Smith),- who denounced the apathy of the Health Department m strong terms.

Time and again the vexed question has been shelved and deferred. Smith made no secret of his belief that some sinister influence was at work m Government circles.

Just what that influence was, he was unable to say, but he summed it up by describing it as "the mysterious Mr. X."

The gravity of the situation has been apparent for some time past, but a letter from Dr. T. H. A. Valintine, Director-General of Health, which was read to the board, brought things to a head and served to show the public that the position is actually worse than was generally supposed.

It is quite obvious that the department is inexcusably apathetic and indifferent to the question if the DirectorGeneral's letter is to be taken as a criterion of the official attitude to a grave state of affairs.

A Campaign That Government Could Take Over

In reply to the board's urgent solicitations for a grant to provide extra accommodation at the Cashmere sanatorium, Dr. Valintine

wrote most djscou raging ly. "In answer to your letter of February 23, with regard to accommodation of male patients, who are victims of tuberculosis m an advanced stage of the disease," he says, "I regret to inform you that just now the department cannot consider making a special grant to your board to provide suitable accommodation for such cases. "Taking into consideration the very large number of patients apparently needing sanatorium treatment m the South Island, where the population is approximately one-half of that m the North Island, I am asking the Minister to set up a special committee of medical men to go into the question why it has been found necessary to provide such a very large proportion of beds for consumptive patients m the South Island.

"It is on these grounds, and these grounds alone, that just now I Would ask your board to bear with the department a little longer before asking

Serious Question

for a special grant to provide necessary and suitable accommodation for such advanced cases." In this way does " the department hedge the very serious question referred to it. It is idle to talk about appointing a committee of medical men to inquire into the reasons for there being so many T.B. patients m the South Island. The point is that these cases are m existence and are m urgent need of prompt attention which the sanatorium is unable to give them at present. If the whole matter is to be left over until the sitting of a committee of medical experts, death will claim dozens of patients whose 'lives might be saved — or, at least, extended — if the problem were tackled promptly and from a commonsense standpoint. It does not require such a committee to find out what is already known to such experts as Dr. G. J. Blackmore, who is m charge of the sanatorium at Cashmere. And the views on the question publicly stated by Dr. Blackmore are startling enough to stir the department into immediate action if it has any proper understanding of the crisis now confronting the country. Dr. Blackmore is m the position of having to turn patients away — patients who are m all stages of the disease and who require specialized treatment and care which the sanatorium is unable to extend to them at present. Men and women are dying m their own homes because there is no room for them.

Bitter Harvest

They are walking about among their fellow men — many of them infectious — spreading the disease and sowing a bitter harvest, not only for the present generation, but for posterity.

The whole of Dr. Valintine's letter seems to be an evasion of the danger. As far back as 1912, according to a copy of the "Gazette," a conference of medical men, similar to the one now proposed by the Director-General .of Health, was set up and carried an important resolution.

The chairman of the hospital board, H. J. Otley. denied that there had been such a conference held, but the Gazette, which was produced and read, clearly stated that there had been. Dominion-wide and concerted action was strongly advocated by the conference with a view to carrying out the recommendations of the experts as to the search for early cases, suitable treatment, the removal of patients from their homes to suitable institutions, education of the public and proper after-care of affected persons.

It was further urged that m the event of unity of action among hospital boards not being attained,

(From "N.Z. Truth's" Special Christchurch Representative.) II The time has arrived— in fact, it. is long overdue—when the Government must take a firm stand on the |! question of tuberculosis. The ravages of this dread disease to-day are such that hospital boards are fighting ll against overwhelming odds. !! The demands of sufferers from the white scourge are gradually submerging them and if the Government If does not listen to the ever-swelling chorus of complaint the octopus of T.B. will secure a stranglehold over the 1[ country which will be impossible to break.

the Government should take over the whole of the T.B. campaign and, if deemed advisable, recover the cost from the various hospital boards. It is reasonable to assume that if those recommendations had been acted upon at the time, great headway would; have been made m checking the ravages of one of the worst diseases known to civilisation.

But the recommendations were shelved — why, or for what purpose, nobody knows. The results are apparent on every hand. The disease is spreading until it is now almost out of hand so far as adequate treatment for every sufferer is concerned. -'•The conditions-: are -deplorable ' a t Cashmere — and that this is so is no fault of the staff or the hospital board. The men's cot cases, which number

Authorities Show Disgraceful Lack Of Purpose

forty and are housed m shelters, are a real problem. These shelters are certainly not the places where such cases should be treated, and on this point Dr. Blackmore is strongly of opinion that the advanced cases are treated under very adverse conditions.^ „. . r: ■ - Nurses are ter cases m all weathers-^— a 'fact -which is little short of a disgrace. There is only one place to treat an advanced case of T.B. — and that is m a ward. The board members are Quite satisfied on this point and the comment of Dr. Blackmore on the shelter cases is further and convincing- proof that conditions at Cashmere are the reverse of satisfactory. But, worst of all, is the herding together of early cases with those m the advanced stages of the disease. The moral and mental effects on new arrivals at the sanatorii/m — confronted daily with sufferers whose days are numbered — may better be imagined than described. In the words of Dr. Blackmore, this is a "thoroughly bad arrangement."

Doctor's Figures

The doctor goes further and describes it as "the refinement of cruelty," which, m the opinion of "N.Z. Truth," accurately sums up the position.

On figures supplied by Dr. Blackmore m his public statement, there are at present 21 women on the waiting list for middle sanatorium and 24 on the Coronation Hospital list, but at least six of the women on the sanatorium list will have to be transferred to that of the hospital, as their condition is worae than was at first thought. Some of the applicants have been on the list since last October and — sad commentary — some of the women have died while waiting. It need hardly be said that the hospital board and Dr. Blackmore and his staff have done all m their power to get over the difficulty. Dr. Blackmore states that m order to relieve the situation, some of the patients on the waiting list at the Coronation Hospital who were living under bad conditions at their homes were actually sent to the Burwood Hospital, where infectious diseases are treated, but the recent epidemic of scarlet , fever has compelled the authorities to discharge the eight consumptives from the Burwood institution.

Four of them will be admitted to the Coronation Hospital, but — as Dr. Blackmore points out — this can only be done by keeping out patients who have a prior claim. As for the other four patients, the

A Modern Nero

only course open is to return them to their own homes. And the really disquieting fact about the waiting lists of women is that most of them are stated to be infectious. No words are needed to emphasize the danger these sufferers are to others with whom they come m contact m their daily lives. These are the facts. Dr. "Valintina knows all about them and yet — m face of such a grave crisis m the health of the community — the Director-General of Health puts himself m the same position as did Nero watching Rome burn while he fiddled. ! And that is what the Heajth Department appears to be doing — fiddling while the flames of a dread disease are burning up valuable lives. To ask the board's forbearance — solely on the grounds that the department desires to set up a committee of experts to ascertain why so many beds are needed m the South Island — is sheer nonsense, which would be laughable if the issues at stake were not of so grave a character. The committee Dr. Valintine has m view will find out nothing that is not

known already and it is a mere quibble which would seem td justify the belief that there is "a mysterious Mr, X" at work behind the scenes. No wonder the board resolved to draw Dr. Valintine's attention to the position, backed up by a list of 20 urgent cases that are now awaiting treatment.

The urgent request that the Government be asked to make a special grant without delay towards the building of a ward should have its effect if the department is genuinely anxious to grapple with a problem which is its own special job after all. Of the grant, the board will have to find £2500, which will carry a £ for £ subsidy.

. But behind all this creditable real and practical solution^'fpr^-' dealing with the white scourge,

not only from a local standpoint,

but from a national angle as well

Hospital boards throughout the country — particularly m the South Islands — are at death-grips with the disease, but any action to be really effective must be concerted and Do-minion-wide, directly controlled by the Health Department.

The menace to the health of the community is of the gravest and the Government has a responsibility which it cannot be allowed to shelve.

In the past it has sat back at the expense of the boards, who have done the bulk of the work, but m spite of all that has been done the problem is fast approaching the acute stage. Hospital boards have not the money available to meet the demands of T.B. sufferers to-day.

That being, so,, the department must bestir itself from its apathy and seeming indifference and take the lead.

There must be no talk of financial stringency when the future health of the nation and the stamping out of a terrible disease is the goal. Economy, if it must be practiced, can be > applied to other State activities without tinkering with a danger that threatens the nation as T.B. is threatening it to-day. The hospital boards will be only too ready and willmg to co-operate.

Feeling is running high on the Suestion and the public looks to T. Valintine and his department to take up the campaign and lead the boards m their efforts to stamp out the disease. . . .

It rests with the department and with the Government. The time has arrived when the State must take over the campaign. A golden opportunity awaits the authorities and it will be .to their eternal discredit if it is allowed to pass by.