A BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE PROBLEM 157 



tenements where the infantile death-rate is higher 

 still.' 



n 



In another place * I have suggested that at least 

 30 per cent of the infantile death-rate in the United 

 States might be prevented; that out of every hun- 

 dred deaths occurring during the first five years of 

 life at least thirty are due to socially preventable 

 causes. This means that as a nation we permit some- 

 thing like 95,000 babies to die annually. I say we 

 "permit" them to die, to express very deliberately 

 the thought that is in my mind, that the deaths of 

 those 95,000 babies each year ought to be set down 

 as due to murder permitted by society. 



Terrible as I know the figures to be, nothing is 

 more certain than the fact that the estimate is a very 

 modest one. Most physicians who have carefully 

 studied the matter would, I think, agree that it could 

 be said conservatively enough that 50 per cent of the 

 infantile death-rate represents a needless sacrifice of 

 precious human material. And that would raise the 

 number of victims whose tiny graves bear witness to 

 our social shame and crime to more than 158,000 ! It 

 has been estimated by French authorities that three- 

 fourths of the infantile deaths in that country might 

 be prevented; that in five years France lost 220,000 



* In The Bitter Cry of the Chiidretii ch. i. 



