Warren sheaf. [volume] (Warren, Marshall County, Minn.) 1880-current, 1919-11-26

M
run, commerce should IS encouraged,
non-compulsory physiolog ical welfareI
work should 90 on, but our police
powers have no right 81 these matters,
since they have their own clear dutiesl
assigned to them il q totally dinerentl
direction, 5s.s n
The prevailing conceptions of thel
ordinary health officer as q weak-kneed, |
amateur policeman, whom 1t Is fun to |
elude, or on the other hand as an on
ciala philanthropist whose chief. duty Is
to advise mothers how to feed babies:
to induce foreign to clean up,' (
and to intervene IN neig hborhood SQUAD
bles about bad smells, are really due to
the misconcep tons of his work, held by
himself, to inadequate equipment, and
above all to the other inad equacies and
fallacies Of part time service. @ II
These misco conceptions and the fright
full made quacies and disrupt ions Of our
official health services are inevitable
chiefly because Of the farcical status of
the part time health officer. He is theI
present day jest Of the community as
the part time volunteer fire Department.
was of an earlier generation.
The fund miscOncep tions are
these, that the pract icing physician lis
from the nature Of his training, neces-i
sarily inevitably s. learned In sanitary
science :; that if he is practicing medi-
cine, he is therefore already engaged In
something closely allied to- public !
health; and that the public health of
the community is anyway so small
matter that he may conduct it quite !
sufficiently well as an incident, as a
small side issue, Of his own daily pri- |
vate practice 81 In brief the vicious cir
Gle is that the community sees nothing
to be done in public health; the part
time health officer is paid to do that
nothing and, because he does that moth
ing quite successfully, the community
is the more firmly convinced than ever
that there is nothing to be done
Our health depar tment work is a bout
1 per cent efficient, not 80, 80, 20 /; not
10, or 5 or =: it is about 3per cent eff
cient, or perhaps less. Here and there
is isolated communities, the figures are
greater. Here and there on, a broad
scale, great victories have been achiev-
ed. In smallpox and in typhoid fever,
iii malaria and yellow fever, public
health has made good. In other dis
eases, it has been demonstrated that 1t
is possible to make good, provided men
and money are available. But this is
as far as we have gone in public health.
Therapeutics, medicine, surgery, nurs
ing, have done wonders, because men
and money have been spent on them
like water. But public health is starved
on both items almost to extinction in
proportion to the demands.
Z The breaking of the vicious circle
may be accomplished by introducing a
wholetime health officer and leaving
| him to work out the salvation of the
public health In his community. But
often, the inadequacy of program and
equipment results in the whole time
man doing little better than his part
time predecessor. Moreover the COM
munity as a whole does not appreciate
prevention, it wants something it can
see for its money Hence there is the
|.old tempta ton, too strong for most
health departments, to collect garbage
or to have ''clean up" weeks Ito make
a showing. Meantime death and dis
ease run along uninterrupted. Hence
also the new temptation to have sbaby
weeks to establish milk depOts," to
do the spectacular, attractive, seeable
things, and in like proportion to avoid
coming to real grips with real disease
and DEATH tuberculosis. syphilis, etc.
Surely baby weeks and milk depots
are good? Yes, but they can be- done
by voluntary associations. The afford
an invaluable and tangible means of
securing the cooperation Of the seeth-
ing energies Of the public, disposed to
public health they are voluntary and
do not require health department con-
troll; they are at present experimental
and therefore not ripe for government
al action. The wise health department
will do. quietly its proper police func-
lions, with the funds ii has for that
purpose It will encourage and aid in
the formation of self financing volun-
teer agencies for those things which
do not require police powers. 1t will
steer clear Of therapeutics.