Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1916-08-25

A MOTHER living in South Carolina write!
"A us that one physician advises her t
keep a knit belly band on her baby all sum
mer. Another one tells her to let the baby
go nearly naked during the hot weather
She wants to know which is right. we tel
her the second-that in a hot climate, where
the temperature Is warm all of the time
and hot some of the time, the baby should
wear no clothes except a diaper and a
cotton slip
This bald statement Is based upon the
following considerations: Body heat is
manufactured by food and work. Rubner
increased the heat production of dog A
per cent. by excessive feeding. Any amount
of food which is proper in cold weather
becomes excessive and produces too mich
heat in hot weather. Rowland showed that
a crying, kicking baby made considerably
more heat than one asleep.
SO much for the manufacture of heat.
Babies will kick and squirm They must
eat in order to grow. Necessarily they
must make an excessive amount of heat.
How do they get rid of IL? BY radiation,
conduction and evaporation.
Clothing lessons radiation, conduction and
evaporation. The more of the clothing the
more It Is stopped Mcclure and Sauer
put some jackets on puppies and put them
in incubators. They found 1t rather an easy
matter to kill n puppy by overlooking him
when the air was hot
In very hot weather getting rid of heat
is a difficult matter. Rubner tells us that
adults with proper food, health and clothing
are at n maximum Of comfort when the
temperature Is anywhere between 61 and
n.
In the adult the clothing is quickly adj
justed to the atmospheric temperature Nc.
Clure and Sauer have been investigating
the clothing worn by infants. 1t shows
surprisingly little difference between the
weights of indoor clothing commonly worn
by infants during the summer and winter"
Helmholta found that great differences in
the temperatures of rooms did not make as
much difference in the health of babies as
he had expected to find. Mcclure and
Sauer say that the reason for Helmholtz's
results Is that the real determining factor
is the clothes the baby wears, rather than
the temperature of the room. With very
careful instruments they found the tempera-
ture of the clothes of baby about de.
grees lower than the skin over the bare
chest of baby. This means that the sur
face of the clothes will lose heat to the air
much slower than the bare chest will.
A baby with clothing over his body be-
gins to get fever, becomes restless, and de-
velops diarrhea--all evidence of heat
the temperature of the atmos.
phere of the room reaches S7.S degrees. If
the baby is naked these heat effects do not
appear until the temperature of the room
reaches 92.6 If the baby is sicliy, frail
overfed or exercising violently these heat
effects appear at lower temperatures. But
In any case naked baby can stand an air
about 5 degrees higher than
can one that is moderately clothed.
This is only a part of the known facts
There is plenty Of scientific proof that
babies do not thrive in hot weather when
dressed heavily. a diaper and a cotton slip
Is the ideal for hot climates in the hot
season. If the weather turns cool a heavier
covering can and should be slipped on
quickly, for babies do not resist cold well.