34 OPENING SESSION 



I have only a few more words, Sir Thomas, to add, and 

 they are these. In looking around we are apt to concen- 

 trate on the slum, on over-crowding, on drink, on bad 

 feeding, on neglect, but we ought not to forget that the 

 greatest peril to infantile life lies in the peril of birth. It 

 must be so, because in some districts of every 1,000 children 

 born, from 100 to 150 will die within a month, even within 

 a fortnight. That means that as much depends upon the 

 conditions affecting the child in utero and at the time of 

 birth as on the conditions after birth. That the perils of 

 birth can be got over by care is evidenced by the way in 

 which doctors save their own children, and by the fact that 

 Hampstead's infant death-rate is half that of Shoreditch, 

 and Battersea's is half that of Burnley. I do believe that 

 until we devise some means by which the working class 

 mothers, especially in the poor districts, shall have some of 

 the care, much of the attention, and nearly all the medical 

 supervision that rich and middle class women have during 

 their pregnancy and at their confinements, much of our 

 work will not be as fruitful as we would desire. How are 

 we to secure that? It is for you in your various sections to 

 determine; but this I can say public opinion, Parliament, 

 the Cabinet, and all the Ministers are willing to help you if 

 this can possibly be done. How can it be done? I will 

 give you a good illustration. I have been reading the latest 

 Report, and an excellent document it is, of a very worthy 

 doctor, Dr. Hope, of Liverpool. Dr. Hope mentions a 

 district in which the infant mortality was 200 per thousand. 

 In 874 families, he says, there were born 3,801 children, and 

 1,895 f these died in the first year, or at the rate of 498 

 per thousand per annum. Now the curious thing about it 

 was that the survivors were very good stock indeed, and I 

 believe Dr. Hope would assure you that, if those who died 

 had got over the particular accident that prematurely ter- 

 minated their existence, their stock would have been as 

 good. Now we ought not to have such a wicked instance 

 of " love's labour lost." We ought not to have the deaths 

 of so many children born of healthy mothers and of good 

 fathers, especially when doctors say that had they survived 

 and got over the preventible accident that shortened their 

 lives they would have been equally as good as the rest of 

 the family. Well, I do not know if these mothers had too 

 many children; if so, it would have provided an excellent 

 opportunity for some other women who had no children to 

 have adopted these surplus youngsters. I would like to see 

 that almost universally done. There are too many women 

 <vlin are childless, mourning over cats and keeping the 



