BIOLOGY IN HUMAN AFFAIRS 



their children to an exposure which is certain to lead to 

 their infection and subsequent suffering or premature death. 



This gloomy picture may seem overdrawn to those city 

 dwellers who visualize the country as a blessed spot where 

 happiness and health flourish. The picture may be over- 

 drawn for some rural areas still unprovided with local 

 health service, but especially favored by climate, natural 

 resources, and economic conditions which enable the 

 inhabitants, by reason of their prosperity, to avoid some 

 of the menaces of ill health through their own efforts and 

 through the medical attention which they are able to 

 secure. The picture is not beyond the facts, however, as 

 regards a significant proportion of some thirty or forty 

 million rural inhabitants of this country. 



Returning now to the city health organizations and those 

 of the states, it is to be noted that the actual financial 

 provision for their activities is everywhere but a small 

 fraction of that for other civic activities fundamentally 

 no more important, such as school maintenance, fire pro- 

 tection, police, etc. Everywhere health protection, as 

 reflected in city and state appropriations, appears to have 

 been an afterthought. This condition is due to two con- 

 siderations: first, that considering the returns, official 

 health work is not nearly so expensive as the other forms 

 of service mentioned; and, second, that health work 

 actually is still somewhat of an afterthought on the part 

 of the average appropriating body. This is apparently a 

 matter of individual psychology reflecting itself in con- 

 certed thought. The average man who is or believes him- 

 self to be in good health finds it irksome to think about 

 ill health or its prevention. Only when he actually becomes 

 recognizably sick does he develop an interest in health, and 

 then it is of course too late for prevention. 



The maximum effect of health work is thus never real- 

 ized, because nowhere is financial provision made for 



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