New-York tribune., 1902-07-29
INFANT MORTALITY HIGH.
MORE DEATHS THAN LAST YEAR, IN
SPITE OF COOL WEATHER.

When Health Commissioner Lederle was asked
by a Tribune reporter yesterday whether as
might reasonably be expected. the cool weather
this season had caused decrease in the death
rate Of this city, he frankly said that It had
not, especially among infants The infant NOR
tality was greater than usual. he declared. and
the Board OF Health was at loss to account for
IL. There had been a falling on however In
the last week in the number OF deaths Of chill
dren under five years old. and II hoped the
decreased mortality due in to
the active summer work Of the Health Depart
ment. Dispensaries had been established AT the
eight recreation piers. where advice and pre-
scrlptions were freely given. The prescriptions
could be filled at drug stores in the neighbor-
hood at nominal cost. Physicians OF the
Board Of Health were constantly going through
the tenement houses and treating the tenants
the same as If they private patients. In
the Nurses Settlement We're nurses doing tene-
ment house work. and they instructed to
call up the department by telephone day or
night, whenever they thought the services OF a
physician were required in tenement house.
Care was taken however. not to interfere with
the regular practice OF physicians.
DR.. Walter Bensel. chief Of the summer corps
of the Board Of Health. said
don't think any one can nj tell you why we have
among Infants. The mortality is greater this year
than It has been several years past 1t is also
was ahead of In mortality. although less crowd
ed, but we are getting ahead OF Brooklyn
talty. In nursing babies milk plays great part.
and probably over half OF the tenement house
dwellers use milk for their babies which they have
these grocery store milk keepers. The law says
30 degrees or less. In some cases have found
the grocers kept no ice at all and other grocers
the milk, and we have frequently found the tenn
perature OF milk as high as 72 degrees. AT that
and babies that get the milk suffer from intestinal
WRere TO vet their l k What VI Rnd to ge how @
modify it for infant feeding; also-which Is very i'm
All the conditions which have obtained In previous
years in this city will affect the death now
though | am not crit,cislns previous adminstra. str
has been wrong for several years back.
w. II. Guilfoy, register Of vital statistics Of
the Board OF Health. said the death rate for the
first six months Of this year was shade lower
than for the same period last year, although
there had been an increase in the number OF
deaths Of children under five years of age
from darrheal diseases. This not so re-
markable, because the temperature of the air
need not be exceedingly high in order to produce
changes in the milk supply coming into the CITY,
consequently affecting the bottle fed children
who depended upon milk for sustenance.
Several years ago, said DR.. Gifoy. DR.. Ballard
of England, discovered that as soon as the
| thermometer placed four feet below the surface
of the earth-reached % degrees II was followed
almost Immediately by deaths from diarrhpal
diseases. 1t did not. therefore, require weeks of
excessive temperature to produce these phe-
nomena in this city. Although this increase in
mortality had held for every week this summer,
In the last week change took place from some
cause, and deaths from diarrhPal diseases We're
considerably lower than in the previous week
Compared with the corresponding week of last
year there were 40 less deaths from diarrhRa
| among adults, and among children under hve
years OF age there were 139 less deaths than
last year. making the total death rate much
lower than in the corresponding week of last
year.
DR.. Guilfoy asked as 10 the prevalence of
malaria this season. He declared that malarial
fever OF the diseases in which the per-
centage OF mortality exceedingly small
There were no means of knowing how many pa
tents in this city had malarial fever. as II was
not a reportable disease In the first half of
this year there were sixty-one deaths from
malarial fever against fty-six for the first half
OF the year 1901. The increase was small
that ii was probable there was no more malaria
existing now than there was last year.