Evening star., 1939-02-14
Of Sturs, Men
And Atoms
. Notebook Of Science Progress
In Field, Laboratory
And Study

IN fieId, Laboratory
And Study b..
By Thomas r. Henry.
This generation is piling up q big sur
plus Of boys.
For the first time in history appar-
emily three factors-mass marriages, in
adequate nutrition of mothers and bet
ter child welfare ef1orts-are operating
together to overthrow the normal pre-
ponderance of girl babies.
This is particularly the case in Ger
many, although the same phenomenon
can be observed through most Of Western
Europe and America, says DR.. Heinrich
Rosenhaupt, former director Of the city
health service of Mainz. It Is one of
the things the Nazi government blames
on the Jews and DR.. Rosenhaupt has
gone into an exhaustive analysis, re-
ported in the current issue Of the Scien-
tific Monthly, journal Of the American
Association for the Advancement Of Sci
ence, to get at the real reason.
Normally, he says, there is almost al
ways an excess everywhere of boys over
girls at birth Of about six per hundred.
The newborn boy, however. is a much
more delicate organism with q greater
chance OF dying during the first year of
life. Because Of this, the ratio between
the sexes has been approximately bal
anced IN past generations. II anything
there has been an excess Of girls. The boy
Is somewhat more complicated organism
with more things apt to go fatally wrong
Just before or just after being born. As
evidence Of this DR.. Rosenhaupt points
out that such hereditary defects as
hemophilia, red-and-green color blind
ness, and atrophy Of the optic nerve are
confined entirely to males.
Statistics everywhere show, he says,
that first babies are considerably more
apt to be boys. Also malnourished moth
ers are less likely to give birth to girls.
This has been demonstrated over and
over again, he says, in animal expert
ments. Some biologists have claimed
that they could absolutely control the
sex of animal births according to whether
they fed the mother lavishly or gave her
just enough to eat.
Both these factors, he points out,
operated 20 years ago in all the countries
at war, and especially in Germany.
Great numbers Of marriages took place
just before the boys went to training
camps. The children of these marriages
were all first births. Many soldiers never
came back from war and, with great
deficit of men, their widows were unable
to find other husbands so that they had
no more children. Consequently there
was big boy surplus in the war genera
ton. This is phenomenon, DR.. Rosen-
haupt says, which has been noted ac-
companying almost all major wars and in
the past has often been considered as due
to divine Intervention to preserve the
population.
The malnutrition of the mothers
helped swell the boy surplus. Almost
continuously since the war in some coun-
try or other there has been malnutrition,
tending to keep up the overbalance of
sexes. BY queer paradox these very
conditions have tended to save the deli
cate boy infants, sometimes at the ex-
pense of the harder little girls. In war
time boy babies are especially valued,
since so many men are being killed.
Especial attention was paid to them
while their sisters may have been neg
lected. Many who normally would have
died were saved
In the periods of economic depression
since the war, for the first time in his
tory, an active interest was taken by all
the governments in children. Food was
supplied for them when there was little
for anybody else. Welfare workers, Wis
iting nurses and government agents went
to the homes, advised mothers, and cared
for sick infants who might otherwise
have been neglected.
The result in the present population
Of Germany, says DR.. Rosenhaupt, is as
follows:
Below years, 965 girls to 1000 boys.
From to Is years, 969 girls to 1000
boys.
From Is to 20 years, s77 girls to 1000
boys.
Actual statistics of jewish Christian
marriages in Germany since the war, DR..
Rosenhaupt found, show a greater un-
balance in the sex ratio of babies than
for the population at large, and the most
has been made Of this in Nazi anti
Semitic propaganda.
1t may be explained in large part, he
believes, by the fact that most such mar
riages take place relatively late in life and
result in either no children at all or only
one. AS result all the births are first
births where male predominance is
normally to be expected. Also, he points
out, such couples as a rule have been in
better-than-average circumstances, able
to give the delicate boy babies better
care than they would get in the average
home. Another factor, he says, is that
they have been most common between
Jewish women and Aryan men and, even
IN the poorer classes, Jewish tradition
prescribes better prenatal care and bet
ter care of infants.
Wants "Other Side"
OF McNinch Story.
To the Editor of The Star:
The millions of Americans who have
tod s~&