NO PARALYSIS NOTIFIED

Taranaki Daily News, 10 March 1932, Page 6

NO PARALYSIS NOTIFIED

POSITION IN TARANAKI DISTRICT. FIVE OFFERS OF BLOOD SERUM. No cases of infantile paralysis have been reported in the Taranaki health district, said the meSical officer of health, Dr. R. J. R. Mecredy, when asked last night whether there had been any indications of a spread of the disease from the South Island, where seven or eight cases were recently notified. There had already been some responses to the department’s appeal for blood from which to prepare serum for treatment of patients, continued the doctor. Jive offers have been received. Two women in New Plymouth, a married womafi in the country with four or five children, and a Hawera resident have all written that they would give samples of their blood. AU of them have had the disease at one 7 time or another, the Hawera resident so long ago as 1913. The fifth offer came from the parent of a girl who had been attacked by paralysis. Dr. Mecredy pointed out that adults, whether they had had the disease or not, developed anti-bodies in their blood as a natural form of protection. The blood of an adult who had not had the disease had about 50 per cent, of the serum value of that of an ex-patient. >lf necessary th© department would ask for such adults to volunteer a supply of blood.