Wausau pilot. [volume] (Wausau, Wis.) 1896-1940, 1920-06-15

clothing are insufficient to make life tOerabie
Particularly in the broad belt lying between the
Baltic and the Black there Is appalling mis-
cry. This great includes the Baltic
states, Poland CZecho-Sloyakia. Ukraine. AUSTRIA
Hungary, ROumania. Montenegro, Albania and
Serbia, to say nothing Of Russia eastward and
Armenia to the south. In all that region there is
almost complete paralysis of national life and in
duStry.
All that part of Europe has today tremen-
dous number of idle people. Many of them want
to work But there is great shortage of raw
materials with which to work. and the import
export situation all but hopeless Such
has been the output of paper money and so much
greater is the need of imports than the POSSIBLE
ity of exports under existing conditions that these
countries have nothing. either money goods
with which to purchase from outside what they
need to- sustain life itself to say nothing of sup
plies for the revival of industry. They totter
the brink Of utter ruin, from which nothing but
helping hand can them.
The depreciation in the currencies of some of
these countries, valued in dollars is unbeliev
able. According to market quotations of April 10,
1t ran as follows:
AuSttld 3i.')bIo
hungary ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS. 81 1870
Germany Observation-Disclosures. 92.}29o
t'reece ............-'-...'. 'f''zo2o
foulnanla ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS l.SlIo
foiand Observation-Disclosures. .9I.9S%o
tZech0-SlOVakia .............-.. 1870
In other words if the peoples of these coun-
tries tried buy materials AMI supplies in Amer
lea at the present market values Of their curren-
cies, Austria would have to pay approximately 40
times the normal cost. Germany IL times, Greece
just double Czecho-SIOvakia II times and Po-
land 80
These figures are official and are the on;y in
dex which can briefly give any comprehension Of
the economic conditions inside these countries
Their currencles deprecated because they
have neither gold nor sufficient production with
which to maintain their normal position with the
United States with their Immediate neighbors.
Until each such country Is able to produce sllffi-
cent to maintain itself either from within or by
importing in exchange for gold or goods, it cam
not hope for normal conditions. if indeed it can
hope to survive. There is nothing difficult of
comprehension about the situation. Somewhere,
somehow. some time those countries must be-
come possessed of food. clothing raw materials
and the means of transporting them. they
must perish. Economically and politically they
crippled TO point threatening complete
paralysis while at the same time the people
ravaged by destitutiOn and disease. The inroads
of the latter on the warworn and undemourished
population has reached the proportions which
Mr. Balfour called appalling"
Men. women and children are dying by thou
sands, and over vast once civilized there
neither medical appliances nor medical skill sufti-
cient to cope with the sanitary crisis.
In the Ukraine. winter of 19lS-19. typhus and
influenza affected most of the population. In viii
lagos of 1000 and 5000 half the people would he
Ill of typhus at the same time. Many physicians
attended territory 40 miles in diameter. Some
who had 10000 TO 10000 typhus patients could
get no medical supplies whatsoever. and could
give only oral encouragement to their sick. And
this year the condition is even worse. Pauperism
Is becoming more and more intense. Prices have
advanced steadily.
In Austria. according 10 a report dated Feb
ruary II, there We're in Vienna rations for three
weeks. People apathetic. fatalistic and
tired, and there was an epidemic of dancing One
dance was attended by 1000 people. half of whom
had~had no dinners. Refusing go home they
danced until exhausted. One hundred thousand
school children were underfed and diseased as a
result of food shortage. lack of fuel and made
Quate hospital facilities. Crime was increasing
among the child population, hunger sometimes
driving little boys TO attempts at murder The