The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1911-08-07
CONSERVATION OF
HUMAN LIFE A Half of All Illness Is Un- necessary = Nation Is Taking Steps-A Nation al Health Bureau Needed
William Jay Schieffelin, Committee of One Hundred on National Health.
Exclusive Service The Survey Press
 Bureau)

i Sickness and death. It has been computed, cost the nation $3,000, ,O0O,- 900 annually. if the value of the la bor lost as their result is capitalized The fact that most of this sum may be saved by proper hygienic measures as well as humane considerations led to the formation of the Committee or One Hundred on National Health, to prolong human lives and to foster ef- ficiency, health, and happiness. To aid in its work the committee orga- nized an American Health League with many thousand members to dis seminate health information and to bring about needed health legislation
 The nation is awakening to the inn- portance of the health situation and the press has aided the work of the committee. Thousands of articles and editorials on public health questions have appeared based on information we have furnished. The following ed- itorial from the New York Journal is an example.
 'In the United States every year there are one million three hundred thousand deaths. Among these. only few are due to old age which will be, barring accidents, the only cause of death when human being become really civilized and intelligent.
 of the 1.30O,00O deaths every year six hundred and thirty thousand are que 10 pTeNentdDlo CAUSES
 .'Thirty-fve thousand are killed by typhoid alone. And remember that typhoid fever is caused always and only by the swallowing of filth in food or in water.
 Tn addition to the thirty-five thou sand that die of typhoid in our coun- try every year about three hundred thousand get typhoid and are cured. We have plenty of money and plenty of good doctors. And when we have eaten the filthy food or have drunken the dirty water, we spend money and intelligence to get well.
 Tt is a pity that some money and some elligence-including preven- tive measures by the doctors and ef- forts of the health departments could not be used to prevent the dis ease instead of being devoted entirely to curing it''
 Prof. Irving Fisher, the chairman of the committee has justly pointed out that life insurance companies can by taking steps to reduce mortality decrease the cost of insurance for policy holders far more than than by pairing salaries. Realizing this the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company has established a consumptive sana- torium. It has engaged visiting nurses to cooperate with visiting nurses as- sociations in certain cities to care for its bed-ridden policy-holders; it has established a health magazine to dis tribute health literature among it's. policy holders, available to 1000, 900 readers, or one-sixth of the population in the United States; and it has en- dorsed in several ways and on several occasions the movement for a Ma tional department of Health
 The Prevalent Life Assurance So- ciety, the New York Life Insurance Company and others are doing prac- tical educatfve work in prolonging human lives.
 The fraternal societies have also en- tered the campaign. Their journal, the Western Review. now has a de- partment especially devoted to the public health Fraternal insurance companies have established sanatoria, and have attempted in other ways to lengthen lives and decrease death claims
 Health insurance, one of the young- est forms of insurance, has made beginning in the field of disease pre- vention. The Loyal Protective Insur- ance company, has, within the last few months, established a health bu- reau to issue bulletins and conduct a sort of correspondence school of health information.
 But the greatest agency of all. the national government, has not yet un- dertaken the work of preventing dis ease in way proportioned to the needs Of 91.000,0 900 people. Senator Owen has introduced in Congress a bill to establish a National Depart ment of Health by co-ordinating the Government present agencies. so they may work more effectively. Dr. Chas A. l.. Reed, in recent speech in Phil adelphia, said that the United States with it's health agencies distributed in the Department of the Treasury, the Department of Agriculture and other departments, is the laughing stock of Europe, while the people of this coun- try are dying from preventable causes at the rate of one every minute.
 At one of the hearings at Washing ton on the subject Of National de- partment of Health, General George H. Sternberg, surgeon general of the army, said:
 'T suppose the only reason why we have not long since had government department to look after the public health and to take the lead in instruct ing the people how to prevent the enormous waste of human life from preyentable diseases, is because our legislators have not heretofore realiz- ed the importance of this subject. Af- ter the great epidemic of yellow fever in 1878. Congress was greatly aroused upon the subject of preventing future epidemics of this disease and a na- tional board of health was organized. But this board was not provided eith- CT with the authority or the financial support necessary to make it a suc-