Page 46 Advertisements Column 1

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XLIV, Issue 25, 22 June 1910, Page 46

The Nicotine Cure.

Smokers will be delighted to learn that a military doctor has discovered, and undertakes to prove by convincing statistics, that smoking, instead of being bad, is good for the health. Better still, smokers are almost immune from meningitis. Tobacco, therefore, instead of being tabooed by some medical men, ought to be hailed with delight, and anyone threatened with the terrible brail, or spinal attack should be at once told to take the nicotine cure. The discoverer of this new scientific fact is Dr. de Kermabon, of the French army. He has patiently gathered statistics and watched the ravages of cerebro-spinal diseases among the young recruits of the French army, and, as their habits, among others that of smoking, are carefully noted in the reports, he was astonished to see that so few of the habitual smokers were attacked by the disease. The proportion, as established by him, is 1 to 20—that is to say, for ono case of meningitis among a given number of smokers, there arc 20 cases of the disease among an equal number of nonsmokers. Wlmt will the society against the abuse of tobacco say to this? Its chief argument hitherto has been that smoking is especially bad for the young. But Dr. Kermabon could argue exactly the contrary, and this is what he does. Itather than discourage young men from smoking, they ought to be encouraged, especially if they are liable to brain or spinal troubles.