The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1916-02-08
DEATH DIRECTLY TRACEABLE
TO POVERTY TAKES TOLL OF
MILLIONS YEARLY IN u. S.
Committee On Industrial Relations Cimpiles Figures
Showing Great and Preventable Waste of Human
Life-Cease1ess Slaughter Causes Criticism

the most wealth.
For instance, the infant death rates
are 228 per thousand for Mckees
Rocks, Pa; 1854 per thousand for
Homestead, Pa; 1903 per thousand
for youngstown, Ohio; and 245 per
thousand for Manchester, N. H.
There is no reason why the death
rates for Brookline and East Orange
should not prevail for the whole Unit
ed States. They would prevail If the
people were given a chance to live.
According to the United States Census,
the infant mortality rate for the Unit
ed States as a whole is 124 per thou
sand and the total number of children
who died in 1910 was approximately
266O16. If the rate had been IT per
thousand the total number of deaths
would have been reduced by 100,828
babies for that year.
In making the above comparisons,
the same method has been used for
computing the death rates in Brook
line and East Orange as for South
Bethlehem, Fall River, Homestead,
McKees Rocks and the other towns
named. The rate was computed in
the only way possible, because of the
lack of birth statistics, by taking the
total number of children under one
year living when the census OF 1910
was taken and total number of deaths
of children under one year in the
same year. The method used when
the total number of born during
year and the total number who died
during the same year. This gives
slightly lower rate and it is on this
basis that the estimate of rate or
124 per thousand for the whole United
States is figured by the United States
Census Buraeu. So that the number
that could be saved is really greateri
than the total of 100,828 here given
In California, the infant mortality
77011TS h
of San Francisco, was 81 per thou
sand. In Los Angeles where an anti
picketing ordinance and government
by the Merchants and Manufacturers
prevent the workers from
organizing, and there are many s1unos
ana factories, the rate was Ito! Gil
mate ir each case cuts down the rate,
but the proportion as between eco |
noInic comfort and economic want re-
mains the same.
In New York city, the United States
Public Health Service found that |
garment workers with annual
earnings of $3.50 or more the child |
mortality rate was ia; while among |
garment workers with annual earn |
ings of sass or less, it was 200
In a second bulletin, the Committee |
will show how poverty takes its toll in |
death and suffering among the older
and among grown men and |
women. 1t will show also how our
political leaders follow up their silence
and neglect as to poverty and its eau
ses by refusing to appropriate the
small sums that would enable even |
the poor to protect their lives and
those of their babies. It will be
story of government by property, of !
executives and congressman who bow
the need to power, who refuse appro- |
priations for the public health because
the poor who suffer from preventable
disease are too inarticu1ate and unor- |
gained to demand protection, or to |
punish public servants, who withhold
it.
In the figures and facts involved in
this subject lie truths SO shocking to
any man devoted to the ideals and !
principles for which the American flag |
stands, that one wonders how any de- |
fender of the flag could ignore this |
dishonor and these atrocities when he |
sets out to awaken the conscience of
his countrymen.