Group

Leprosy In Cook

Dr. Ellison Examining Northern Islanders

From Our Own Correspondent.

Rarotonga, Mar. 24.

DR. E. ELLISON, Resident Medical Offi cer, has gone north on the N.Z. Govt, vessel Matai and will examine the North ern Islanders for signs of leprosy. Those affected will be taken to the Government leper station in Fiji.

Leprosy in the Cook Group has greatly decreased as the result of careful surveil lance, local segregation and ultimate removal to Fiji, from which place a sub stantial percentage return home cured.

The majority of cases come from the Northern Islands, where, in 1926, some 14 lepers were taken off from Manihiki and Rakahanga. From the same two islands this time there will in all probability be less than half that number and of these three are under 19 years of age.

It is pleasant to think that the Matai’s arrival will most likely be the means of saving these young lives, doomed other wise to one of the most appalling of lonely deaths.

Temporarily relieving Dr. Ellison is Lieut.-Colonel F. W. W. Dawson, who retired from the R.A.M.C. in 1925 after 21 years’ service. Colonel Dawson was until recently in Christchurch, N.Z., as Medical Health Officer and he is now making his first visit to the South Seas. Stocky, erect, blue-eyed, Colonel Dawson carries about with him an invigorating atmos phere of “thermometers at attention,” which is in itself a menace to ill-health.