IXFANTILE MORTALITY. 697 



the infant's digestive capabilities, sterilised to destroy contaminating 

 organisms, and supplied in ytoppered and sterilised bottles containing 

 sufficient food for one meal, and no niore, to prevent home contami- 

 nation. 



As the largest part of the immense mortality of the first year of 

 infant life is traceable directly to disorders of nutrition, the question 

 whether a child will be strong and robust, or a weakling, is often 

 decided by the quality of the food given to it during the first three 

 months of its life. 



It must be remembered that temporary success may mean ulti- 

 mate failure. 



A good illustration of this is seen in the too exclusive use of 

 patent or proprietary foods containing much carbohydrate. The 

 absence from the food of some of the more important elements in body 

 building may not be evident for months, hence the common mistake 

 of the laity that children fed on these foods are thriving. Infants so 

 fed grow very fat and for a time appear to be properly nourished, but 

 this outward appearance of apparent robustness is false and fleeting. 

 The natural, and therefore the best, food for babies is the mother's 

 milk for at least nine months of life, but as mother's milk is not 

 always available, we have to face this problem — viz., that for a large 

 and increasing number of infants artificial feeding is a necessary evil. 

 The question then remains as to whether this artificial feeding is to be 

 well or badly performed. 



The object of the municipal infants' milk depot is to reduce the 

 heavy infantile mortality dependent upon improper artificial feeding. 

 The depot is not intended to weaken parental responsibility. 



In France, where a very low birth-rate has compelled the question 

 of infantile mortality to be considered as of national importance, 

 efforts have been made to improve the defective methods of infant 

 feeding by the establishment of organisations having for their object 

 the encouragement of breast-feeding and the supply of a specially 

 prepared milk for those infants for whom breast-feeding is impractic- 

 able. 



At the French institution, the Goutte de Laif, which is the pre- 

 cursor of the British milk depot, the medical supervision of the babies 

 is a most important feature of the work. The baby is brought to the 

 depot once a week to be weiglied and examined by the medical 

 director of the institution. 



Some of the Gouttes de Lait are municipal institutions, but the 

 majority are managed by philanthropic societies. 



The French institutions not only care for the child l^ut for the 

 mother as well. The French have realised that many a suckling 

 mother required nourishment as well as her child, and restaurants 

 have been established in Paris where women nursing at the breast are 

 fed gratis twice a day. 



" There is no question asked as to birth, religion, or legitimacy. 

 The woman is hungry, and has an infant to feed, and that is sufficient 

 for the French philanthropist." 



The movement for the supply of a modified milk for the use of 

 infants, particularly of the artisan class, has now become a con- 

 siderable one both in Europe and America. 



