The Waterbury Democrat., 1939-06-03
WHAT WE OWE TO OUR NAMBY-pAMRY DIET

ANALAAAMS
 Infants nowadays get fair break in the way of nutrition. Older chil- dren and adoIescents do not. Thanks to the vast. amount of information and instruction given the public in the past thirty years by public health and personal agencies, on the care and feeding of Infants, the gen- eral nutrition, health, growth and development of babies is far superior to the physical standard of child health which was considered excel- lent in the days when grandma's s squalling was subdued with pap or paregoric. But once the baby is weaned from breast or bottle, the public health and personal agencies that have felt so much concern for his welfare wash their hands of him and leave the poor kid to get along pretty much on his own. From this point on, various vendors take over, and once these birds have their tal- ons in him they hang on for dura- tion of childhood-which runs for not less than thirty years consec- utively.
 Twenty years ago, before many laymen had even heard of vitamins (the first article on vitamins in this column appeared July 27, 191D--and ain't filing systems wonderful?- physicians recognized in school chil- dren from nursery school or kinder garten up to high school or college age a common under par condition which they called cachexia scholast- ica. Characteristic feature of this condition: Unsteady nerves, easily overwrought by trifes, unnatural ir- ritability bordering on hysterical in some instances, disordered digestion finickyA appetite, poor assimilation nutritional anemia, fiabby muscles slouchy or weak posture, chronic fa- tigue, deficient power of attention and poor memory. In most in- stances the young person is under weight. If it is 8 girl, perhaps moth- CT worries and decides the girl k delicate" but will outgrow it; if Q boy, then mother just worries.
 As this nutritional deficiency is as common among youths and young adults who have finished school ol college as among school children, g more suitable name for it is Cach- exia Americana, in my opinion.
 Most children coming to America from Southern Europe have sound teeth. It is notorious that most American children have carious teeth. America is the home o1 hokum-it is fed to the population in lieu of elementary education nj hygiene. Add to features of each exia Americana defective teeth.
 The essence of cachexia Ameri- cana is nutritional deficiency. Not insufficient food nor badly cooked food nor food unsuited or unpre- pared for digestion, nor food that has just been predigested or sub- jected to some other process which the gullible layman has learned te think necessary. The fault lies ir the lack of adequate vitamins and minerals in the refined food which supplies most of the calorieS in thu average American dietary today.
 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS Hay Fever Season in Offing
 This year I'd like to prepare fol the annual hay fever season by fol. lowing the treatment you recon. mend. My season starts, usually, thu 10th of June. How do stave it offl (R. W.)
 Answer-Short notice. However hurry 8 stamped envelope bearing your address to me and I'll send the monograph of instructions right back.
 Pasteur Treatment 4 Some time ago you stated, if I un- derstood correctly, that you would not submit to Pasteur treatment in any conceivable circumstances. May I ask why not, or just what you would do if bitten by rabid ani- nal? (Mrs. T. W)
 Answer-I'd fear the effects ot the Pasteur virus more than the possibility of rabies. I'd want such wound treated by a surgeon, disin- fected as a surgeon would disinfect any unclean wound, then prophy- tactic dose of anti-tetanus serum and nothing more in the way of treatment, until 8 week later when vo,,r cerio,,c ta1k tno Tells con.