The states-graphic. (Brownsville, Tenn.) 1???-1984, 1918-08-02

confronted by the following conditions:
Almost all of the man-power of the
nation was either with the colors or
engaged in the work of providing for
the army. As a consequence the in
stitutiOns organized before the war
for child welfare had been materially
effected. In the first place there was
lack of physicians. In some commu-
mites in France there have been no
doctors since 1914. In some cases
doctor has had to take care of as
many twenty-five towns, visiting ech
but once in five or six weeks. In the
United States there is an average of
cne physician for every five hundred
PEOPLE. In France the dearth of medi-
cal men runs as high as one doctor to
10000 inhabitants. Is there any won
der then that the children of France
suffer?
While there is variation in individ-
ual instances, as a whole French chill
dren underfed, undernourished and
insufficiently clothed. The average
death rate in France is 100000 babies
every year.
At the outset this children's Bureau
of the Red Cross made it plain that
its work was to be undertaken for aid
ing the French in the care of their
babies and to assist the institutions al
ready established for child welfare
work.
Work had to be begun for the health
Of the children of France and for
France itself at Evian-les- -Bains, a
town on the shore of Lake Geneva and
the gateway through which the Ger
mans were sending back to France the
CID men and old women and the chill
6ren in order that they might rid
themselves of the burden of them. In
one week fifty of the children examined
| here by the Red Cross were sent to the
hospital for treatment for contagious
disease. A hospital was established at
Lyons to take care of those not in
need of immediate medical or surgical
attention. By means Of this exami-
ration the doctors made a very i'm
portant observation Of the underde-
velopment and undernourishment of
the French children; they learned just
where to begin to bring them back to
normal
The greatest medical problem which
confronts France today is tuberculosis.
1t kills about $4,000 of her population
every year. This means more than
two hundred a day.
A branch of health work that the
bureau considers all-important is an
education of the mother and child in
child-welfare work. Medical treat
ment is incomplete without this. The
bureau in undertaking this adopted
five lines of endeavor: (1) The
strengthening of all existing child
welfare organizations. (2) Tht de-
velopment of system of listing
nurses or health visitors ard training
stations for their educ .on.
90 The distributio' u pamphlets on
public health, especially manuals for
mothers (4) Welfare stations where
mothers may bring their children for
examination and there secure instruc-
tons as to the child's diet, etc. (5) The
aiding of all hospitals and public milk
stations to obtain experienced health
assistance.
The visiting nurse system is expect
ed by the bureau to do a great work
in France, To carry on the work in
educating the mothers in child welfare
a great child welfare exhibit was re-
Gently held at Lyons. This same ex-
hibit viii be held at three other French
cities. When it is carried to Paris,
the president of France will open the
exhibit"
In the Red Cross Magazine this
touching incident is related by the
editor of the Wichita (Kan.) Beacon:
"At Toul met a wonderful little wo-
man, Madame Tirrell, of gentle birth
and formerly accustomed to all the
comforts of life. Her husband is in
the trenches and she is working alone
on her little farm, twelve miles be-
hind the firing lines. If she tries to
work in her fields in the daytime, the
Germans drop a shell thereabouts and
she has to run to the shelter of her
underground dug-out where she lives
day after day. AT night she goes out
under the stars alone and with her
gas mask in readiness around her neck
she has plowed and sowed and reaped
thirty acres of wheat. Last August
she took ten days vacation to give
birth to her baby. At the end of that
time she brought the boy to Toul to
turn it over to the American Red
Cross. | endeavorcd to say whata
heroine | considered her to be, and she
passed it off as a matter of course.
When she left, she said Goodbye,
Mr.. Allen, know that the American
Red Cross is going to take care of my
baby, but l must get back, for France
reeds my grain more than my baby
reeds me-"