TALKS ON HEALTH.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 12755, 26 September 1919, Page 4

TALKS ON HEALTH.

BY A FAMILY DOCTOR. . TO PREVENT golds. Simple methods : are often bests One of the way's to pre Ten- colds add bronchitis and catarrh or the tin oat is to use a handkerchief. Walk into an infants’ school and ask the teacher if 'ho will kindly ask he class to hold up handkerchiefs. Yon Will find very few children will he aide to produce the article. Now children s noses <irn near the ground, and the dust gets into them more readily than into the nose of a. six-footer. If, the child’s little nose is blocked up With mucus and roaddust the air-way is closed, mouthbroatiting results with all its attendant ills. If the .air doet go through the? half-loosed nose it carries road-dust down into tne lungs. A child has no instinct to guide it; a chicken or a foxterrier puppy knows all that a self tesptet-inu young animal ought to know, but a cH id has to rely on the Wisdom r't'l guidance of parent® and guardians This may bring home to you the enormous task a poor, iihloriunrite teacher of hygiene undertakes. Poor ihe! I am indeed, sorry fob myself. I have .to tench the people to take care cf their children, and the mothers and fathers do hot Know that a child should lie taught t-d blow its nosh. They know nothing. The people know ho more about- hvgiehe .blifh they feadw about the than in the hi< bn. It is too fhuch for their limited intellects to grasp that a note,, should, be ksnt clean. Thev do., not understand that there is any d fference between a hose clogged wit!’ a na-stv mixture a! dirt and mucus and •’ nose that is sweet and clean. Oh ckar. the fierhts that we have in the scnools! Y hen I die and thov cut me up at the post mortem thev will find a handkerchief wrapped round my heart.

THE WORLD OF THE MICROBE. Haro you ever looked dowul a microscope and seen a microbe? 1 must give you an exhibition one day. 1 know you would Have the, creeps if I said :On that glass slide are enough diphtheria germs to bill all your family. However, I think.you ought to know something about disease germs. 1 cannot see germs with the microscope, unless they are stained with dyes. You can stain microbes like you' stain carpets. Some take one stain, some take another. If I wish to look for tubercle bacilli in the sputum of a tuberculous Patient j I spread the sputum on a glass slide in a. thin layer. If 1 warm it the sputum and the bacilli are feed to the glass. Then I stain the whole thing pink with ;i pink solution. The washing of the glass Hide with a bleaching solution gets lid of the dye in everything except the tubercle bacilli; they hold oh fp the dye as a. fast colour Finally, I stain the Whole slide blue; tlio bacilli mMin biflk and the rest of the held is stained blue. Xow, when I IbolT down the microscope I see the tm\ little, bacilli picked, out a.5 pink rods on a blue ground. No Wohdei* the true oaiise of consumption lay hid for *o long; the microbes ate tefv tihv ereh when magnified linder a liigii P 6 VS . *ls microscope, Diphtheria &© Kta-iticd. blue; gerniS. afe sMhOd like a drumstick, aiid the round head stains fed aiid the haiitllO bliiO. GROWING DISEASE. In doubtful mites of sore throat the microbes are taken oh a swab and examined hi a, laboratory ; if the special germ is found WO know we hato to deal a. case of diphtheria. Now. We can keep these microbes in a laboratory just as the animals can be kept in a zoo. TVe can study their habits; we can find out what they like, and, more to our taste, we can find out what they don’t like. We can grow disease germs in a warm cupboard like a chicken-incubator and note that they like the warmth; we can then trv them in a cooled chamber; we can grow them on while of egg or on broth; we can mix a little carbolu. or other antiseptic with the broth and see how they like that; We can boil them; we can test different kinds of chemicals in different strengths, and so on indefinitely. THE VALUE OF, RESEARCH. At the end of it all, what do we learn ? First and foremost, we learn that research is a good thing; the professors in the laboratory are alt working for the public good; they are men who ought to be admired and eneourageci. I complain most bitterly that it is the custom to despise brains. The hornyhanded One is the only man to engage the public attention. Passions are aroused and fierce turmoils are created in order to get a rise for the labourer, Wit a scheme to help and encourage the fighting of disease by employing clever brain-workers at a handsome salary is turned down. Brother Hun with ail his detestable faults, had learnt the power of brains, and had obtained a monopoly in chemical manufacture. I was dependent on Germany for the drugs 1 wanted to treat my patients with. I hope that is changed now. Tim mass of the people may have learnt a few lessons bv the war. The worst fault of the Englishman is that he is very suspicious of clever people. And yet, if he only knew', the successful fight against disease by training brain-workers to study bacteriology and chemistry would bring happiness and relief to many a poor family forced into poverty and distress by the illness ot the breadwinner. Disease is an expensive luxury; Wo keep disease in out midst by our own folly, and the money cost amounts to tens of millions of pounds per annum. It would be a business proposition to spend millions to save tens of millions. ANTISEPTIC VERSUS BACILLI. "What we are striving to discover is some antiseptic* that wall kill perms but leave the healthy tissues of the body free. 1 could give you a pint oi pure carbolic to drink; that would kill the gems all right, but, incidentally, tt would kill you. 1 must find something that will enter the blood, circulate through every part, of the body, pick out the germs and kill them, and leave the healthy eonstituents of the body untouched. TV© are getting very near to the discovery, very near indeed. The latest treatment of venereal disease is the injection into the blood of a preparation of .arsenic, and it is having wonderful results. I am sorry to say this preparation was not discovered ; n England;, we had to look to Germany for it. But improvements are being introduced, and we may hope that any future discoveries may be placed to the proud record of the Old Country.

reliable rheumatism REMEDY. No matter how lons you may have suffered from Rheumatism, you two if, to yourself to try RHEUMO. It seldom fails to remove the urio acid in the blood—-the cause of the disease. The gradual easing of the pain as the excess acid is o* celled, the subsidence of inflammation and reduction of the swelling will come as a blessed relief to you, as it did to those who tried other “ cures ” without avail- Read what a well-known resident of Port Ahuriri writes:—-“I experienced the pains of Rheumatics or Rheumatic Gout, and for eight Or ten Weeks had to take to my bed. My sufferings wore very severe, so bad in fact that even the closing 'of a door would make itay heart jump. I decided to try RHEUMO. 1 got rblief and was soon able to get about and follow* my occupation.” RHEUMO is a proven remedy—-it seldom fails to bring relief. 2s 6d and 4- 6d. 59 Bairaolough’s Magic Nervine stops Toothache. Is bottle, chemists and Ntores. Pregandra cures Corns quickly. 1