INFANT MORTALITY 233 



been some improvement in the death rate of children under 

 five years of age during the past fifty years, although a 

 study of the vital statistics in New York City shows that 

 the infant mortality is about the same now as it was 

 a hundred years ago. 



The baby, Hke the fledgling, is "all mouth and stomach." 

 The rate of growth is enormous; that is, a baby weighing 

 about seven pounds at birth will, under normal conditions, 

 weigh about twenty-one pounds at the end of the first year. 

 In other words, the baby has trebled its weight in a year. 

 The strain upon the digestive apparatus to furnish nourish- 

 ment for this great growth and development frequently 

 results in a breakdown and ends in disaster. 



The causes of infant mortality 



There is no doubt that many an infant is sent to an early 

 grave through drinking dirty or infected milk. However, 

 the quality of the milk is by no means the whole story. 

 The causes of infant mortality are multiple and complex. 

 In order to determine just how much of the great volume 

 of sickness and the high percentage of deaths among infants 

 during the first year of life is due to milk, we must examine 

 into the principal causes of infant mortaUty. 



The first and chief cause of infant mortality is infancy 

 itself. This is the period in which the organism has the 

 feeblest resistance. In this respect it corresponds to old 

 age. The two extremes of life have been compared to the 

 candle which flickers feeblest when lit and again when 

 burning out. 



In general, the fundamental causes of infant mortality 

 are poverty, ignorance, and neglect. As the direct result 

 of poverty we have poor housing in overcrowded districts, 

 vitiated air, the necessity for mothers to work late in their 

 pregnancy and very soon after confinement, insuflScient 

 food for nursing mothers, improper food for children, de- 

 privation of mother's milk, inability to escape from the con- 



