El Paso herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1901-1931, 1910-11-11

1910, as against 1872 per 1000 in those
| months of 1909.
Heat Causes Death.
Improper methods of feeding, over
feeding, and weather conditions, were
mentioned among the causes of the
high mortality due to summer diarrhea
by DR.. Herman Schwarz of the pedi-
atric department of the, Maternity
| Polytechnic, of New York city, in a
paper embodying the result of the
study of the infancy of 1900 children.
1.-The question of decomposed or bad
milk is naturally an important one,
he said, and has been in the foreground
a number of years. By the term bad
milk we usually mean one that is very
acid or even sour, yet during the past
few years it has been clearly demon
strated that acidified milk in the form
OF buttermilk is certainly not injurious
to great many infants, and certain
German authorities have gone SO far
as to say that sour milk does not play
any role in the summer mortality.
From our own material it can be seen
that even breast babies are affected
during the summer time. for we have
80 breast babies sick in April, SO In
July and 100 in August. 1t is easily
conceivable, then, that infants alimen-
tarily disturbed by improper feeding
are simply killed by the excessive
heat"
Scores Medical Schools.
DR.. Ira S. Vile of New York this
morning scored the medical schools for
their failure to give adequate training
in the principles essential to the pre-
yention of infant mortality.
1T is generally admitted that one
half of the infant deaths is prevent
able; medical schools do not give -suffi-
cient attention TO the subject Of
hygiene or prOphylaxis," he said.
Education is conceded to be the
greatest factor in the prevention of
infant mortality. Medical schools do
not so train men as to make them
capable of teaching nurses, internes,
mothers, or philanthropists."
Urges Education.
The education of the public in the
possibilities of prevention, through the
newspapers, and the education Of
the school children in infant hygiene
were two of the measures for reducing
the infantile death rate, suggested by
DR.. S. w. Newmayer of Philadelphia
Every department of health should
have its Publicity Bureau" he said.
under the chNTge of a competent
newspaper editor.
The instruction of school children IN
the essentials of infant hygiene the
speaker characterized as "a strong
hold of education" He predicted that
the effects of the training of the older
pupils in >the care of the baby, by
means of lectures, exhibitions, demon
strations and textbooks, would show in
the more Intelligent motherhood of the
next generation.
The efficiency of health departments
in inf
greatly augmented, DR. Newmayer
said, by the employment of a corps of
visiting nurses. or Of especially trained
physicians, who could give the neces-
sary instructions to mothers in their
homes, or could give individual care
to sick babies.
Would Educate Fathers.
The Importance of educating the
fathers in the essentials of infant
hygiene was emphasized in a paper biz
DR.. William Palmer Lucas, of Boston,
who said that such classes were a fea-
ture of the work of the Milk and Baby
Hygiene association of Boston.
Decries the Bottle.
Dr. Thomas c. Southworth of New
York said that competent maternal
nursing offers the newborn infant the
best chance of survival because breast
milk is adapted by nature to the in
fant's needs, stimulates digestion,
favors more immediate and we'll
rounded growth, and contains certain
natural principles not present in other
milks. If infants who died from all
causes were divided into the two
groups of the bottle-fed and the
breast-fed, the mortality would always
be larger in the former class. Many
deaths not ascribed to bottle feeding
are really due to the poorer develop
ment and lessened resistance resulting
from such feeding. Many babies are
put on the bottle soon after birth be-
cause the mother is thought not to
have enough milk, when the milk could
be made more abundant by proper
feeding and hygiene.
More knowledge is needed of how
the nursing mother may feed and care
for herself so as to give milk more
abundantly. Responsibility for popu-
lar ignorance rests upon the educator
who fails to teach the rising genera
ton of young women the first priu-
cipleS of the care of children