The Daily News FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 22, 1929. FIGHTING TUBERCULOSIS.

Taranaki Daily News, 22 November 1929, Page 8

The Daily News FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 22, 1929. FIGHTING TUBERCULOSIS.

The discussion which took place at the meeting of the Taranaki Hospital Board on Tuesday relative to the proposal that the State should transfer the administration of the sanatoria for consumptives at Pukeora and Otaki to a group of hospital boards, was, as might be expected, mainly confined to traversing the prim ciple involved in that proposal whereby the various boards would become responsible for financing the sanatoria without having any control of the institutions. In effect, the new departure means that the cost of fighting tuberculosis, instead of being defrayed out of the Consolidated Fund, is to be met by the same means as are now applicable to general hospitals controlled by the boards, namely by direct levies on the ratepayers. The two scourges which are responsible for high mortality statistics, and in regard to which world-wide research and experimental treatment are being made, are cancer and tuberculosis. There exists a strong body of opinion—professional and lay—that favours national and not local efforts in conquering these two virulent diseases. In either case the cost of administration and treatment, as well as of research and experiment, would necessarily fall upon the public, but while the general hospitals are financed by the ratepayers these special institutions, when financed by the State, would partake of a portion of revenue obtained through the Customs. That phase of the matter is, however, only one reason why the State should be responsible for the treatment of tuberculous and cancel’ patients. In a matter of this kind, although the provision of finance is of much importance, the main consideration should be the success - of the campaign against the heavy toll on human life. No expert knowledge is required to grasp the fact that it would be the height of folly to create a board representative of sixteen hospital boards in the southern part of the North Island to take over the sanatoria for tuberculous sufferers. Such a board, to be of any service, except as money raisers, must necessarily be professional experts instead of merely nominal controllers. The chief object of these sanatoria is not merely to try and effect cures, but to keep in touch with all the latest results of research and experiment, also to co-operate in testing alleged remedies, and generally advancing the efforts of scientists by keeping a close watch upon the various stages of the disease, thereby assisting the work of research. No matter from what angle the proposed unloading of the State’s control of these sanatoria is regarded, it will be practically impossible to evolve a single convincing, sound reason in its favour. On the contrary, there are many cogent reasons why such sanatoria should be absolutely national in every respect. In the future, when, it is to be hoped, success will have crowned the efforts of the seekers after a cure for both tuberculosis and cancer, there will be no need for special institutions for those suffering from these scourges. Then will also come the time when the whole principle of hospital administration may well come under review. In deciding to take part in a preliminary conference of the Taranaki Hospital Boards, as a prelude to the larger conference at Palmerston North, the Taranaki board acted with commendable discretion. The department’s proposals are of such a nature as to require the most serious consideration. Nothing is more certain than that unless the boards take a firm stand in supporting the principle that the whole duty of fighting tuberculosis is a national one, the boards will find themselves in the position of being mere catspaws of the department.