Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1921-02-05
The Facts M;sstated

| T.
IVE future as a nation" as the House
Committee on Interstate anC
Foreign Commerce declares in it's report
favorably recommending for passage the
Sheppard-Towner bill for public protection Of
maternity and infancy. No one will quarrel
with the committee for this assertion, and
we are not disposed to question the legisla-
tion that the committee urges, although II
smaccks strongly of paternalism.
If the Interstate and Foreign Commerce
committee had stopped with its platitude
about the "the key to our FUTURE" we would
have been disposed to withhold comment on
the report But the committee did not STOP
there. The report contains other assertions
that are not platitudes. On the contrary
they contain information which IS startling
if true, but which we do not believe to be
true
at is safer to be a mother in seventeen
important foreign countries" than IN Ameri
ca land in ten foreign countries babies nave
a better chance to live than in America" are
among the assertions contained in the re-
port. 1t is assertions such as these that we
doubt.
Again, the committee declares that ina
ternal mortality and infant mortality from
maternal eau es are increasing in the united
States and progress is being maze III
checking it."
1t is a sad commentary upon the United
States and blow at the medical profession
for the committee to assert no progress, has
been made in checking material and infant
mortality, and we will have to be shown be-
fore we believe that there are seventeen
important foreign countries in which it is
safer to be mother than in the United
States.'
The report Of the Interstate Commerce
committee on this measure is in keeping with
what seems to be the popular thing with Con-
gress committees of circulating exaggerated
statements to strengthen to the cause of spe-
cial legislation. We have in mind a recent
committee report that declared the general
average of the educational level of America
ranked ninth among the nations of the world
We questioned that statement and remarked
then, as we remark now, that re would like
to be shown.
1t seems absurd for a committee of Con-
gress or any other body of inc1vfdaals to Sc
riously state that the mortality of mothers
is higher today than it was few generations
ago. The committee, to be sure, doesn't make
that statement in SO many words but the
implication is there, just the same. The COM
mittee contents itself with the assertion that
mortality among mothers and infants is Gin
creasing," ard it adds that no progress is
being made to check it,
In support of it's statement that mortality
is increasing, the committee quotes an insur-
ance actuary to show that more mothers died
in 1920 than in 1919. The statement means
little or nothing, if true. To be worth any
thing, the comparison should run over dec
ade or, better still, a generation. Compar-
alive statistics for two years are of no value
in discussion of this kind.
AS the Montgomery Advertiser we'll re-
marks, "As matter of simple fact, it is
doubtful if the medical science has made
more progress in any department of its work
in recent decales than in the care of moth
ers in child birth and in the care of infants.
Vital statistics abound everywhere to refute
the statement that the mortality of mothers
and infantsais on the increase in the United
States and other enlightened countries. 1t
might profit this committee of Congressman
. . to consult the census figures available in
the archives at Washington
Everyone knows that it is the best boast
of science that expectancy OF the average
person is higher today than ever before, so
that the statement of the committee on In
terstate and Foreign Commerce is all the
more surprising.