’Flu in the Pacific

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 569, 23 January 1929, Page 9

’Flu in the Pacific

EPIDEMIC RAVAGES ROTUMA ISLAND

Whole Population Affected

(Lnited PA..—By telegraph — Copyi-ighl) (Australian and 3T.2. Press AssociationJ

Reed. 11.40 a.m

A X e Pidemic of broneho-pneui on the island of Rotuma. under Fijian administration. hf J h , e case occurred on DecemIsisntl , ter the arrival of the interIsland steamer Makatea. With the Comm'° n ° l Dr ' Carew ’ the Resident Commissioner, two Europeans, and some 50 Fijians, the latter proving immune, every one of the 2,300 inhabif n . ts , ;, s , affected. The deaths so far total 31, equal to 1.3 per cent, of the population. The epidemic is now Practically the whole of the work of attending the sick devolved on Dr. Carew, as the native medical practitioner was also a sufferer. ) lealth of the Rotumans has beep bad for some vears it is stated, and last year a commission consisting of two doctors from Fiji was sent there to inquire into the health of

SUVA, To-day. monic influenza lias broken out > 500 miles north of Fiji, hut the islanders. It is suggested that intermarriage has somewhat weakened the resistance of the natives to disease. Lying about 500 miles north of Fiji, Rotuma was discovered by the Pandora in 1793, when searching for the mutineers «3f the Bounty. Adjoining the main island from two to four miles from the shore are three small islets, Hatana, ITofliua ajid Uea, but of these only the lastnamed is inhabited, and contains one small village. In 1579 the three principal Rotuma chiefs offered the islands to Great Britain, and they were annexed on May 13, 1881. The principal island is seven miles loner by three broad, and contains about 9,000 acres. A census taken in November. 1922. showed the total number of Inhabitants to be 2,357. Of these, 21 were Europeans, 41 of mixed race, and 2,174 Rotumans. A European Commissioner, who combines the position of Provincial Medical Officer with bis office, controls the island for the Fijian Government.