424 MEDICAL SECTION 



which will be urged against intimation of pregnancy 

 is that the private life of the individual would be 

 disturbed. Apart altogether from those who become 

 pregnant although unmarried, and who naturally 

 desire to keep the knowledge of their condition to 

 themselves, there is a considerable number of married 

 women who, from modesty and other feelings, desire 

 to keep the condition secret. One has of course 

 every respect for such feelings, but I am convinced if 

 it were explained to a representative body of women 

 that intimation of pregnancy would be of the greatest 

 possible benefit to all expectant mothers, and particu- 

 larly young mothers pregnant for the first time; I feel 

 certain that almost without exception they would 

 agree that notification was desirable. 



When one looks back upon the various diseases 

 which have become, certifiable specific fevers, tuber- 

 culosis, ophthalmia neonatorum as each of these 

 havebeen added to the list there have been protests 

 that the liberty of the subject was being interfered 

 with, that the private life of the individual was being 

 disturbed, that enormous hardships were being placed 

 upon certain individuals. Of course the sentiments 

 and feelings of many were disturbed, and a few may 

 even have suffered bodily harm as well as mental 

 disturbance. But at the present moment would any- 

 one propose that notification of these diseases should 

 be abolished, or that the notification of birth should 

 be abolished ? Certainly not, and remember that 

 although pregnancy is a physiological condition, very 

 frequently indeed at the present time from our mode 

 of life and other causes it is not physiological, it is 

 pathological. It may not have its hundreds of 

 thousands of victims, as tuberculosis has, but believe 

 me there are in this country many hundreds, yes, 

 several thousands, of mothers and many more children 

 lost who need not be lost. They are lost because the 

 expectant mother and the parturient succumb to com- 



