MISS JULIA C. LATHROP'S PAPER 87 



of a child less than a year old and if, as we are told, 

 at least half of these deaths are preventable by methods 

 that we already know then the American public 

 cannot disregard the call to action, nor can we ignore 

 the larger implications of social welfare presented by 

 the statement of Newsholme : 



" Infant mortality is the most sensitive index we 

 possess of social welfare. If babies were well born 

 and well cared for, their mortality would be negligible. 

 The infant death-rate measures the intelligence, health, 

 and right living of fathers and mothers, the standards 

 of morals and sanitation of communities and govern- 

 ments, the efficiency of physicians, nurses, health 

 officers and educators." 



Again, we are challenged by the Report of the 

 New York Special Public Health Commission, just 

 issued, which shows for that state that, since 1902, 

 the rural and village death-rate has slowly risen, that 

 it began to exceed the urban death-rate in 1909, and 

 that "since that date the divergence between the 

 two, in favour of the urban death-rate, has steadily 

 increased." 



The Report of the Commission continues : ' The 

 work of this Commission may be said to be to 

 ascertain how the rural and village death-rate can be 

 made to follow the urban death-rate in its downward 

 course." Partly because the limited appropriations 

 forbade the Bureau's undertaking extensive inquiries 

 for the present, and partly because the great cities of 

 this country have already under way many successful 

 civic and volunteer activities for reducing infant 

 mortality, while the necessity for such work, being 

 less obvious in smaller communities, is not yet 

 thoroughly recognized, it was determined to under- 

 take a series of studies into infant mortality in small 

 industrial centres and rural communities as our first 

 field work, and it is a preliminary statement regarding 

 the method of this inquiry that I should like to 

 submit here. 



