WESTERN SAMOA.

Otago Witness, Issue 3808, 8 March 1927, Page 31

WESTERN SAMOA.

HEALTH OF THE PEOPLE

WELLINGTON, March 2. Dr Norman White, a member of the health organisation of the League of Nations, recently visited Western Samoa at the invitation of the New Zealand Government and made inquiries into the public health work that has been done there, and is still to be carried out by tho Administration. He speaks in the highest terms of the results which have been achieved in combating disease and improving the health of the Samoan people. Dr White, who is a recognised authority on tropical diseases, has had 17 years service in India, and is familiar with the health conditions in practically every country in Asia. He came to Australia as the representative of the League of Nations to attend the International Conference convened by the Federal Government to consider the health problems of the Pacific. After the termination of the conference he had the opportunity of visiting certain of the island groups of the Pacific, amongst them being Western Samoa. & The very appreciable proportion of the total revenue of Samoa expended on the public health pleased him very much indeed. Yaws, a disease which in former years was so serious a malady amongst the natives,—is now, he says, a thing of the past. “None of the communicable diseases now present problems of very great difficulty, except perhaps filariasis, which, as is tho case in most Pacific islands, is a disease which is rather prevalent. The combating of the spread of .filariasis is a question of mosquito control, which, in the conditions prevailing in Samoa, is a matter of very great difficulty indeed. This question lias not escaped the attention of the local administration, aud quite recently an expert from the London School of Tropical Medicine completed two years’ study of the disease and its prevention, and Dr White looks forward with very great interest to seeing his report. “The authorities have at last succeeded in reducing the death rate to a figure very appreciably lower than the birth rate, and consequently one can look forward with confidence to a steady increase in the population unless some new epidemic disease should make its appearance, but I see no reason to anticipate such a catastrophe,” he continued. The measures taken for hookworm control have doubtless contributed a great deal to the improvement iu the general health conditions of the people. Hookworm control is almost entirely a matter of general sanitation, to which subject a large amount of attention is now being paid.” Dr White says he was particularly impressed by the healthy appearance of tho children.