INFANTILE PARALYSIS.

Waikato Times, Volume 102, Issue 17133, 21 June 1927, Page 11

INFANTILE PARALYSIS.

dominion investigation.

MONKEYS EXPERIMENTED UPON. NO DEFINITE ADVANCE. It is not generally known that a regular supply of monkeys come into New Zealand for experimental purposes. This fact was disclosed by Hon. J. A. Young, Minister of Health, speaking at Hamilton/, last night. These monkeys, said the Minister, were used for investigating the nature and causation of infantile paralysis. Following upon the epidemic of 1925, he said, the New Zealand Division of the British Medical Association made representations to the Department as to the desirability of carrying out an enquiry into this disease. Dr. Hector was appointed to undertake this work, his salary being provided by the Health Department, and arrangements were made with the Otago Medical School for the work to be carried out in that institution. The enquiry necessitated obtaining monkeys from Calcutta, but this was arranged and regular supplies have been coming to hand since that time. The enquiry had. however, met with several difficulties, the main one being the fact that Dr. Hector has had to depend upon material from the 1925 epidemic, and it had been exceedingly difficult for him to obtain fresh infective material. While considerable progress had been made in mastering the difficult technique which surrounded the problem from the laboratory side, and which included the proper care and attention of the monkey (an animal with which previously we have had no experience), no definite advance could be claimed in regard to our knowledge of the disease.