The enterprise. [volume] (Harlem, Mont.) 1899-1926, 1911-10-26

A physician can only put the patient in conof
ton to weather the storm as we'll as possip1e'
But while little can be done after the disease
has developed, careful parents can do mucn 10
prevent their children from taking the malady.
The children's noses can be kept clean. DIR. Flex'
ner regards this as most important. Also, certain
disinfectants, if used mouth and nose WASH
during the summer danger period, are effective.
one per cent. solution of hydrogen peroxide Will
kill the germ of infantile paralysis. So Will
plain mentho Each OF these statements Is made
upon the authority of DR.. Flexner.
Yet the germ that causes infatnile paralysis Is
more virulent than the germ OF rabies. DR.. Flex-
ner discovered that the paralysis germ could not
even be weekend by drying it for weeks over
caustic potash by keeping 1t frozen for weeks.
But hydrogen peroxide and menthol kill 1t.
DR.. Flexner is and has been for some time
conducting experiments to learn whether flies
carry the germs and spread the disease. He has
already definitely learned that flies do carry the
germs, but he has not demonstrated that the
germs, when carried. get into the system and
produce the disease
Infantile paralysis came to this country from
Scandinavia Prior to 1907 it had seldom occurred
here. Since then it has been epidemic from the
Atlantic to the Pacific New York and Boston,
where go many Immigrants gather have suffered
most. Minnesota, to which SO many scandinavtans
remove comes next The disease fourshes dur
ing hot dry summers. 1t Is sort OF sister
disease of cerebrospina meningitis and, years
ago. was probably often mistaken for that disease.
A conspicuous point of difference is that the for
mer malady comes in late winter early spring,
while nfante paralysis in summer. In
fantile paralysis is most likely to attack children
less than four years Old though adults are not
immune But one attack most likely makes the
subject immune for life DR.. Flexner's expert
ments upon monkeys indicate much.
But, barking back to the of preventable
deaths of children, this much more may be said:
Mothers are too prone to buy medicine from doc
tors and not enough given to buying Information
from them. Mothers who do not know how to
care for their children should not walt until
child is sick and then call the doctor to dose the
child They should call the doctor when the
child is we'll, and pay him his regulation fee for
sitting down half an hour and instructng them
with regard to the care OF the child Most mothers
need information more than their children need
medicine, Doctors, when called. often give harm
less medicine, when none is needed simply be-
the public feels that 1t must have something
for it's money. The public is not wise enough
to know that 1t can spend its money In no better
way than to buy certain information that tends
toward the maintenance of health. Diarrhea. for
instance, which kills more babies, perhaps, than
any other single cause, is solely disturbance
of the digestive tract due to wrong feeding. Milk
containing thirty-seven million bacteria to the
cubic centimeter-Or even mil!iOn-will cause it.
Cows milk not properly modified is certain to
upset the stomachs OF infants. A halfhour with
a good physician will enable mother to get in
formation that may prevent her child from sicken-
ing and dying.
In the meantime, the responsibility for the
avoidable deaths OF children must largely rest
with the few who knowing how to take care OF
their own, do not for one reason or another, take
effective measures to pass this knowledge to
others A few men control every government
national state and municipal, These men, II they
wanted to, could compel government to dissent
nate the vast amount OF information concerning
info MT fO
when her brth-rate became low that she had
to move. When children become scarce, govern
ments are sometimes careful of their health ~
they are at other times OF the health OF hogs