HEALTH IN SAMOA

Stratford Evening Post, Volume LIV, Issue 53, 30 December 1924, Page 5

HEALTH IN SAMOA

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BETTER SANITARY CONDITIONS.

CO3IBATIN(f HOOKWORM.

Per Press Association. '?■■■ Auckland, December 20

A review of health •■■Conditions in Samoa and the work done during fee past year was given by Dr. T. P. Ritchie, ohief mediaal officer of Samoa, who arrived by the Tofua on a three months' holiday visit to New Zealand. Dr. Ritchie stated that the fight against tropical diseases was bearing good results and the general health outlook was very bright indeed.

"Thi s year has been an extremely healthy one," continued Dr. Ritchie. "We are gradually getting better sanita»y conditions in the Tillages and the natives are becoming more alive to the benefits of Western medicines and Western sanitation, so the general health ®f the people cannot but improve. For the past four years Dr. Ritchie and his assistants have been waging war with the hookworn and yaws diseases an,d now the results of the battle are beginning to show. During the twenty months since free treatment was brougat into vogue 50,000 injections had been given for yaws alone in Western Samoa. Yaws is a tropical disease very prevalent in the South Pacific. An average bf three injections are required for each case and from 15,000 to 20,000 cases had been treated out of a population of some 34,000. Dr. Ritchie said that ovoer 90 per cent, of the natives had been proved to suffer from hookworm, a desease that resulted in anaemia and general debility. They were treating hookworm oh the lines followed by the RockMler Foundation and th«se methods were proving eminently successful. "We consider that we have ftiese two diseases well under control," added Dr. Ritchie, "and at the present rate of extinction they should be almost eliminated in a year or two."

A decidedly pleasing feature of the conditions in Samoa durm g the past year, both from a medical point, of view and from the point of view of future prosperity and welfare of Samoa, was the appreciable increase in the birth rate. Although the vital statistics of Samoa are not completed for 1924, Dr. Ritchie estimates a total increase of about three per cent, of the'present population. The estimatedt number of deaths is 800.