The Sun 42 WYNDHAM STREET, AUCKLAND TUESDAY, JULY 23, 1929 THE RISKS OF INFECTION

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 722, 23 July 1929, Page 8

The Sun 42 WYNDHAM STREET, AUCKLAND TUESDAY, JULY 23, 1929 THE RISKS OF INFECTION

SMALLPOX has arrived at Brisbane, necessitating a rigorous practice of strict quarantine methods. It was brought; to the Queensland port by coloured members of an American steainer‘s crew. This visitation is Brisbane‘s bad luck. The loathsome disease might just as easily have come to the cosmopolitan port of Auckland, where administrative authorities are now so contemptuous of the danger of infection from sea-borne disease that they are talking of changing the quarantine policy of the community and abandoning the special station on I\’[otuihi Island. They have been fortified in their prospective intention by anonymous medical opinion that the risk of infection and the so—ealled need of strict quarantine regulations have been much exaggerated. ‘ Authorities all over the world, with apparently the. exception of Auckland. are agreed that fever hospitals for the reception of patients suffering from infectious diseases, particularly scarlet fever and diphtheria, should be built. on a site with a dry subsoil and a good fall for drainage; also, where. possible, should be. outside the towns which they serve. but with good facilities for access. )[oreover, around each fever hospital there. should be ample grounds, while the administrative block, separate wards for patients suffering from different. infectious diseases, and essential outbuildings, including the kitchen and storerooms particularly, should be detached. Such are the rules of medical experts on those general infections diseases which, though much too often are serious enough, really do not frighten any intelligent community. As regards the treatment of smallpox—— there can be no guarantee that Auckland is completely immune—— the isolation hospital. without exception, must not be. situated close to any peptilated neighbourhood. If this disease should be brought from overseas to this centre of population, it would have to be dealt with on an island of which one end has been set apart as a popular marine park or playground. So, it will be noted by discerning folk that there can be. some queer and foolish ideas about political gifts and administrative policy. Meanwhile, in the centre of an expanding city which cannot be held back from steady growth“ the general hospital administrators are determined, with what only can be described accurately as unpardonable obduracy, to build a big block for a fever liOspital on a site within a good throw of a stone from the main hospital and residences along Grafton Road. The best recommendation of the site is its possession of a good fall for drainage. And it is also possible that the subsoil is *dry. Time and again in this column protest has been made in blunt terms against the obstinate decision of the Hospital Board to build a fever hospital in the main hospital grounds on the Domain Hill, which soon will be nothing more than a. terrace of menaces to public health. Several members of the board themselves liave grave doubts as to the wisdom of the board’s policy, and it has been admitted both with frankness and fortitude that the prospective fever block will have no residential accommodation for nurses or medical administrators, and no adequate provision for the preparation of food for patients. Food will have to be trundled from the main hospital kitchen, and nurses will have to go hither and thither between the fever block and their ofi‘icial home. And already, according to the testimony of the board’s chairman, nurses have carried infection to private houses in and about the city. Then the chief medical administrator has told the board that, in such inadequate accommodation as has been provided for the treatment of fever patients, there have been cases of cross-infection. t And still the board persists in going on with its foolish scheme to erect a fever hospital in the centre of the city. It has been asserted that the medical staff supports the project. The public would be interested to know exactly what the medical advisers actually said about the risks of infection, and whether Auckland experts are opposed to their confreres in other countries. Residents and ratepayers of the popular Grafton district (as reported in The Sun yesterday) have made a strong protest to the board on the subject. It does not appear as if the board meant to. take serious heed of perfectly reasonable objections. There is another court of appeal. The. petitioners may approach Parliament and demand adequate safeguards from the risks of infection and depreciation of their property. THE CURSE 0F POLITICS . ____+___ THERE are 686 local bodies in the Dominion, and each one of them reacts at intervals to a common impulse, the urge to send a deputation to Wellington. They do it jointly or singly, at long intervals or short, and with eagerness or reluctance. But the ultimate surrender amounts to certainty. The local councillors themselves know what it is to receive deputations, little groups of earliest citizens whose requests embrace nearly all the ills that may beset the sufl'ering ratepayer. So perhaps they feel that they themselves should have a turn. Deputations break out like a. rash on specific occasions. The visit of a Minister of the Crown to a rural district is always certain to produce a healthy crop. The progress of his car is impeded every half mile or so by wayside delegations, and in consequence a rural territory may yield more deputations to the hour than a city the size of Auckland. The cities, be it said, arrange their deputations in a grander manner. They await the opening of the session, another favourable season for deputations, and then send their mayors and councillors forth in state to share for a space the majestic atmosphere of Parliament Build~ ings and wait upon their chosen victims in carpeted chambers. When to the number of local bodies is added the sum total of chambers of commerce. progress leagues, and all the other assoeiations of kindred purpose, the source of potential deputations becomes inexhaustible. Furthermore, many deputationists are fundamentally incapable of realising that a Minister’s time is valuable. and that only rarely can they present any new aspect of the case before him. A member of a Canterbury deputation last week distinguished himself by occupying over an hour in presenting his ease——and there were others to follow! At the end of the voluble business the well-meaning delegates were informed that they really need not have come! Similarlv the. Mavor of Auckland has been twice to Wellington about the relief subsidv. but for all that the public knows the exact form of the methdd adopted is still a mystery. Deputations in New Zealand are the curse of politics. but politicians must often ask themselves how much thev are to blame. There is something wrong with the integrity of the. political system when serious questions brought up by mail cannot be assured of thorough attention until they are backed up bv an interview. Since Ministers of the Crown began to stump the country like commercial travellers, country and town alike have regarded them as fair game. Perhaps they are. But deputations cost. this country an enormous amount of public money each vear. I; is lllg‘ll: time that penny stamps were given their fair share of e wor ’.