SEPTIC ABORTION

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22964, 20 August 1936, Page 16

SEPTIC ABORTION

MARRIED AND SINGLE WOMEN COMMITTEE OF INVESTIGATION (From Our Parliamentary Reporter) I WELLINGTON, August 19. The appointment of a committee to !inquire into the incidence of septic abortion among both married and single women in New Zealand was announced to-day by the Minister of ■Health (Mr P. Fraser). The members •of the committee are as follows: Dr ;D. G. M'Millan, MP. (chairman), Dr T. F. Corkill (Wellington, president of 'the New Zealand Obstetrical Society), Dr Sylvia Chapman (medical, superintendent of St. Helens Hospital, Wellington), Mrs Janet Fraser. (Wellington) and Dr T. L. Paget (inspector of private hospitals, Department of Health, Wellington). . "The committee has .been asked to report on the incidence of septic abortion among women in New Zealand, said the Minister, " and to indicate how New Zealand's figures in this respect compare with those of other countries, to inquire and report regarding the underlying causes of septic abortion in the Dominion, including the medical, social, economic and any other factors involved, to recommend what steps should be taken to reduce and if possible to eliminate the occurrence of septic''abortion, and generally to report on any other related matters affecting the subject. The committee, if necessary, will visit centres outside Wellington for the purpose of gathering evidence." •' The Minister remarked that, as the ;public was aware, the Department of ■Health for many years past had been devoting special attention towards reducing the maternal mortality rate in New Zealand. Quite a measure of success had attended .those efforts and the number of deaths due to child birth had been materially reduced, so that New Zealand's statistics under that heading now compared favourably with those of other comparable countries. During recent years, however, the department's work had brought to light the fact that there was an increasing number of deaths from septic abortion taking place in this country. "Such cases," continued the Minister, "included both married and single women, but the former predominated. A preliminary inquiry has already shown that during the five-year period between 1931 and 1935 112 married women and 34 single women died from this cause,, the married women leaving behind them no fewer than 388 motherless children, of whom 291 were under the age of 16 years." . The Minister added that it was recognised that the problem of reducing the occurrence of septic abortion was not merely a medical matter, but that other factors of a social and economic character entered into the question. Recently the New Zealand Obstetrical Society had passed a resolution urging the Government to set up a committee of inquiry to investigate and report on the whole subject, and the Government had decided to accede to that request. ____________