A Conference on prevention of infant mortality : Lampson Hall of Yale University New Haven November 11 and 12 1909 ; third mid-year meeting American Academy of Medicine (specializing in medical sociology).

  • Conference on Prevention of Infant Mortality (1909 : New Haven, Conn.)
Date:
1909
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A Conference on prevention of infant mortality : Lampson Hall of Yale University New Haven November 11 and 12 1909 ; third mid-year meeting American Academy of Medicine (specializing in medical sociology). Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    rate of infant mortality among the children of such parents is its great- est social danger. Many others, fortunate or unfortunate enough to survive its first effects, grow into a weakling childhood and manhood, a misery to themselves and a public charge. Few greater problems offer themselves to the philanthropist, to the social worker, the teacher and the state. The false position assumed toward social diseases by the authorities and the consequent ignorance of the far-reaching effect of such diseases is an everlasting disgrace to our modern civilization. It is high time that physicians, knowing its perils, force upon the powers that be the right of the public to protection, as in the case of any other contagious disease. The details of the required laws and methods of making them efficient will work themselves out. It is not merely prohibiting a fool from his folly. Too frequently the innocent suffer; the state is called on to support weaklings, and racial degen- eracy results. (7) The curative powers in human milk J. Madison Taylor, A. M., M. D., of Philadelphia Abstract: Scientific substitute infant-feeding, primarily a boon, often proves a peril. Physicians are lulled into a false sense of security and too readily allow mothers to omit breast-feeding. Mothers, both rich and poor, too often assume that it is just as well to use the bottle, thus imperilling life and health, and especially right constitutional develop- ment. Sifting the evidence emphasizes the well known but inadequately realized fact that breast-feeding is of paramount value, not only as a food but as contributing to prevention and cure of infectious and other diseases; and, (2) the testimony from physiology as to the curative powers residing in the autoprotective qualities of the serum of milk, especially human milk. (8) Excessive child-bearing as a factor in infant mortality Dr. Alice Hamilton, Hull House, Chicago, (Memorial Insti- tute for Infectious Diseases) Abstract: This paper embodies the results of a statistical study of 160 families with regard to the number of children born and the num- ber who died at birth, in infancy or in early childhood. The families selected were almost all from the poorer wage-earning class, the par- ents being foreign born in all but 3 per cent. Families with six children and over were placed in one group, those with four children and less than four in another group. The percent-