MAN'S IMPROVEMENT OF HIS ENVIRONMENT 395 



Ex-President Roosevelt said, in one of his latest messages to 

 Congress : — 



" There are about 3,000,000 people seriously ill in the United 

 States, of whom 500,000 are consumptives. More than half of 

 this illness is preventable. If we count the value of each life lost 

 at only $1700 and reckon the average earning lost by illness at 

 $700 a year for grown men, we find that the economic gain from 

 mitigation of preventable disease in the United States would ex- 

 ceed $1,500,000,000 a year. This gain can be had through medical 

 investigation and practice, school and factory hygiene, restriction 

 of labor by women and children, the education of the people in 

 both public and private hygiene, and through improving the effi- 

 ciency of our health service, municipal, state, and national." 



Work of the Division of School and Infant Hygiene. — Besides 

 the work of the division of infectious disease, the division of sani- 

 tation, which regulates the general sanitary conditions of houses 

 and their surroundings and the division of inspection, which looks 

 after the purity and conditions of sale and delivery of milk and 

 foods, there is another department which most vitally concerns 

 school children. This is the division of school and infant hygiene. 

 The work of this department is that of the care of the children of 

 the city. During the year 1912, 279,776 visits were made to the 

 homes of school children of the city of New York by inspectors 

 and nurses. Besides this, thousands of children in school were 

 cared for and aided by the city. 



Adenoids. — Many children suffer needlessly from adenoids, — 

 growths in the back of the nose or mouth which prevent sufficient 

 oxygen being admitted to the lungs. A child suffering from these 

 growths is known as a '' mouth breather " because the mouth is 

 opened in order to get more air. The result to the child may be a 

 handicap of deafness, chronic running of the nose, nervousness, 

 and lack of power to think. His body cells are starving for oxygen. 

 A very simple operation removes this growth. Cooperation on the 

 part of the children and parents with the doctors or nurses of the 

 board of health will do much in removing this handicap from many 

 young lives. 



Eyestrain. — Another handicap to a boy or girl is eyestrain. 



