The Star. SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 27, 1926. PREVENTION IS BETTER THAN CURE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18015, 27 November 1926, Page 8

The Star. SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 27, 1926. PREVENTION IS BETTER THAN CURE.

“ The dangerous forties ” were in the minds of members of the Hospital Board this week when they supported the suggestion for a compulsory medical examination of all persons over that age. There are, of course, no substantial objections to be urged against a medical or a dental overhaul once a year, and one of the greatest difficulties doctors are faced with is the refusal of the rank and file of the public to be “ wise in time ” even where actual disease symptoms exist. Yet an annual overhaul—over forty—is in the domain of palliative rather than preventive medicine, and it would be better to so educate young people in good habits of life that they would escape the penalties that come in the form of disease in later life. And where the education of the masses is concerned the daily newspapers offer the greatest help. This fact has been emphasised strongly in English files just to hand, in connection with the statement of Sir Thomas Horder, president of the 8.M.A., that “ the lay Press is certainly the most powerful medium we possess for instructing the public on health matters.” But whereas Sir Thomas Horder is in favour of the publication of articles on health matters, he suggests anonymous articles, censored by a committee, and no newspaper so far has been in agreement with him on this subject. The following extracts from English editorial comment on the subject are instructive:—■ The public have never been able to understand, says the “ Daily Mail," why physicians and surgeons of distinction should not be allowed to write in the lay Press over their own names or why one eminent man should resent seeing another eminent man’s name in print. Precautions must, of course, always be taken against quacks and charlatans; but the high position held by leading English newspapers renders it certain that they would never allow such people to exploit the public and no one would venture to suggest that a man of such European reputation as Sir William Arbuthnot Lane is a charlatan or wants to advertise himself. And the attempt to muzzle so great an authority is bound to fail because it is a relic of that obscurantism which in the past tried to conceal every scrap of medical knowledge from the man in the street. The ban on signing health articles must go, because it is obsolete. Such an arrangement (anonymous censored articles) will satisfy nobody, says the “ Westminster Gazette.” The experts will object to being censored. The public will insist on knowing who it is who preaches to them, and what is his authority for doing so. And the newspapers want to deal with matters of public importance in * their own way—which, after all, is the expert way from the point of view of the publicist—and without the intervention of a committee which, at its leisure, may be expected to reduce every article , to the level of an unattractive technical treatise. The Horder plan will not do; but as an indication that the B.M.A. is awaking it will be welcomed. The “ Daily Mail,” indeed, immediately launched a series of articles, “ Secrets of Good Health,” by Sir W. Arbuthnot Lane, and he has undertaken, in simple nontechnical language, to show how and why the human organism benefits or suffers from the various physical influences to which it is subjected under the complicated conditions of modern life and diet. “ The function of the medical man,” he says, “ has too long been limited to curing ailments which elementary knowledge of the rules of health would have prevented, and very much of the sickness and suffering in the world is due solely to ignorance of elementary facts about the body and its functions.” The movement is one that must grow. The New Health Society of Great Britain has issued signed articles by experts on the education of the public in diet and habits. These articles are being sent to the “ Star,” and it is significant that the Public Health Department of New Zealand is following up the matter with similar articles. Prevention is better than cure, and however necessary a medical examination becomes where health laws have been violated, education offers the greatest hope in the prevention of disease. Consumptives come from all parts of New Zealand and from overseas for treatment at the Cashmere Sanatorium, and the three months’ residential qualification for admittance is not the slightest bar, because there is always a waiting list, and people have been prepared, in the past, to live in Christchurch for twelve months in the hope of gaining admission. The same thing occurs in Otago; in fact, the South Island hospital boards have taken up the fight against consumption so seriously that South Island ratepayers arc helping to carry the burden of a national work, while no North Island board, so far, has done anything to establish a sanatorium. Therefore, if the pooling of hospital board resources is to be adopted in a national fight against the disease, it should be done on an inter-island basis, so that the southern boards will not be penalised for their public spiritedpess in taking up a work of national importance. United action is necessary to avoid sectional differences, but, in the interests of efficiency it would be wiser to allow local boards to deal with their own districts. If a tuberculosis board were set up in each island, as Dr Blackmore suggests, it could allot patients to the most suitable institutions, and ensure a proper distribution of patients. At all events, the campaign against tuberculosis should he taken up nationally, and those provinces that have shown the way to the Government should not be penalised any longer for their enterprise.