T.B. IN AUSTRALIA

Timaru Herald, Volume CLIII, Issue 22474, 8 January 1943, Page 5

T.B. IN AUSTRALIA

Spread By Refugees

SYDNEY, Dec, 18. Refugees suffering from tuberculosis had come to Australia with certificates of good health, and were a danger, Dr. John Hughes, of the T.B. Division of the New South Wales Health Department told a State Parliamentary’ Joint Committee on Social Security. Many of the refugees, said Dr. Hughes, knew they had the disease when they produced their health Certificates. In cases where they had four or five children, each child was liable to infection.

To eliminate The disease. Dr Hughes said, X-ray at an early age was urgently necessary. He suggested that everyone should be X-rayed at 15, 20, and 25 years. He added that until a couple of months ago the military authorities had notified the department of cases of T.B. found in the army. There had been an average of 200 of these cases a year. As a result the department had been able to arrange for prompt treatment, and in most cases to effect a cure. There was an urgent need, he said, for at least 600 beds for T.B. patients The ideal would be a 400-bed hospital in Sydney, from which patients, after treatment, could be drafted to sanatoria.

The New South Wales Directorgeneral of Public Health. Dr E. S. Morris. told the committee that T.B. would be wiped out in Australia in one or two generations, and infant mortality could be reduced by 15 per cent, if adequate health measures were instituted. In 1940. he said .the mortality rate from T.B. was 3.2 per 1000 of population, and the infant mortality rate 21.42 per 1000 live births.

Dr. Morris urged the introduction as soon as possible of a scheme to coordinate and integrate all medical services on a national basis. Such a scheme would so improve the health and welfare of the people as to place Australia in the vanguard of progress, he declared. “In most B. cases in this State.” he added, “a child became infected from the parent at an early age, and the disease lay dormant until adolescence was reached. Then, when resistance was lowered, the disease started. If people were X-rayed early their disease would be discovered and it would be possible to effect a cure.”