New Guinea.

What Medical Science Has Done For

[To The Editor.] Sir, —It was with interest and not a little inward chuckling that I read your article on New Guinea in the August issue.

You certainly have placed your fingers on a few vibrant chords. I do not intend to criticise Administration methods of running this vast Territory (most of us could successfully run a Territory—perhaps!) except in one in stance, which is at variance with your statement that the Administration does not foster private enterprise.

With regard to the Malaria problem and public health. I certainly disagree with what you say. During 1915 I sampled Rabaul as a health resort (?) and venture to state that malaria then and now are two vastly different dis eases. Kavieng, 1915-1916, ditto. Lor engau, Manus, 1916-1919, ditto; also Madang, 1921-1929. The difference can hardly be described, as from 20 to 15 years ago Madang was recognised as a veritable death-trap in these islands.

Now it is as healthy as most places up this way. This was brought about by P.H.D. activities, draining the town ship and nearby swamps and enforcing sanitary regulations by court fines, etc.

Rabaul it was recently stated, was entirely free from the anopheles and malaria. I do not altogether agree with that statement, but I will say it is a much healthier place to live in now than it was at the time of changing hands in 1914, despite the fact of the enormously increased population, which

entails more supervision from a health point of view. Many improvements have been made and much P.H.D. at tention given to combat the fever breeding pest. Private enterprise and population have not done this entirely, so must credit the medical department for a little of the work and thought in this matter of Mr. Anopheles, who has decreased his activities here, I should say, by at least 80 to 90 per cent, in the past 18 years.

Malaria is a much misused term in many instances up here; and our nose diving friend with the spotted wing gets the blame very often for things he does not do. One kind of malaria is caused by that very interesting occu pation of taking crimped tops off bottles—the symptoms usually show up the morning after. (I know, because I’ve had it.) Of course, enterprises and plantations outside Administration Centres natur ally must attend to their own health, and the extinction of the Anopheles, in their immediate vicinity. Advice as to how this could be done would, I am sure, be supplied by those who know how, upon request to the right quarter.

With regard to the Administration not fostering private enterprise—Mr.

Editor, you are wrong. In one instance, anyhow. Why is it that a person not employed by the Administration may not obtain the services of the Adminis tration doctors who, we are to believe, are Public Health officials? The two doctors practising privately may be ex cellent and very efficient men at their job, but surely the public should be per mitted to choose their own physician — especially as some of the Administra tion doctors have almost reared one’s own children from birth and through the few years of the little one’s life in not a few families in this Territory.

This state of affairs has only just re cently come to pass in Rabaul. There is a mistake somewhere that should be rectified. The Administration fos ter private enterprise.

Other articles on this Territory by your pen will be looked for with relish.

More power and success to your P.I.

Monthly!

I am, etc.,

Territory Resident.

Rabaul, Sept. 18, 1932.

EDITORIAL NOTE. —We are glad to publish this tribute to the good work of the Health Department of New Guinea. We freely ac knowledge that this Department, working along orthodox lines, has done much to render the town fit for European occupation. But the Ter ritory generally is still full of malarial fever; and our complaint is that the Department ap parently has made no attempt to deal with the general problem of preventing infection through the Anopheles Mosquito. There was, for in stance, the discovery of a predacious mosquito which feeds upon the larvae of the Anopheles when the latter is deposited in tree-water; yet nothing has been done to cultivate and study the predacious insect, with a view to using it to control the Anopheles. The problem of con trolling malaria by such means is an enormous one; but the benefits to be gained by even a small measure of success in that direction are equally enormous, and worth working for.