CO885-(18-19) — Page 486

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

Reference :-

THERE C.O.885

19 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO

Federated Malay States and Hong Kong. Had these been given they would have shown what can be done against malaria by good adminis- tration, and, by contrast, what can be left undone by bad.

(2) The published reports show generally little obedience to the direction of the Secretary of Státe. Most of the writers have evidently scarcely troubled to consider the matter at all, or to write anything like fulf, intelligent, and useful accounts of any work that has been done. (3) The published reports from the Bahamas, Barbados, Jamaica, and St.

Kitts-Nevis show, to my mind, nothing but neglect of public duty. (4) Those from Northern Nigeria, St. Lucia, British Honduras, Grenada, Somaliland. Straits Settlements, and Sierra Leone, give no decisive evidence of the reverse.

(5) Those from Southern Rhodesia, Papua, Mauritius, British Central Africa, Gambia, Ceylon, and Southern Nigeria are much better, but still furnish no account of several measures that may have been undertaken.

5. It is difficult to explain the real import of all this. As a general rule malaria causes in the tropics from a quarter to a half the total sickness. Thus in Mauritius (which is by no means exceptionally unhealthy), out of 79,053 cases attending the various hospitals and dispensaries during 1907, 28,204, or 358 per cent. attended for malarial disease alone. In the same Colony, out of 31,022 children recently examined, 10,595, or more than one-third, were found to be actu- ally suffering from enlargement of the spleen due to malaria-that is, were infected with malaria. In other words is disease alone often causes in the tropics almost as much sickness as all the other diseases put together. The total sum of illness, disability, misery, poverty, and death produced by it can only be imagined. To remove it even largely to reduce it may then confer a benefit on the public equal perhaps to the benefit conferred by all other efforts of medical and sanitary science put together, for which Governments pay such large sums of money in sanitary schemes and salaries of doctors. In certain places, added to malaria, mosquitoes cause immense misery or mortality from filariasis and yellow fever, which can be removed by almost the same measures as those which remove malaria. These measures are not only evidently feasible and useful, but have been abundantly tested and proved in many places. What then are we to say of the Governments of Colonies which wilfully and ignorantly neglect any serious efforts towards under- taking them?

It is not as if these measures were enormously expensive. In Section 40 of my report on malaria in Mauritius I recommend a list of ten measures. Some of these, namely, legislation, wise organisation, and the repeated measurement of malaria by examining the spleens of children, cost nothing at all. Others, such as giving quinine to sick children in schools and many "minor works" against mosquitoes, cost almost nothing less perhaps than the salary of a single European official. The whole of our estimate for Mauritius (nearly 400,000 people) amounts only to £9,000 a year, being only about one-sixth of the entire annual medical expenditure. Yet in many places nothing at all is done-not even the work which costs nothing.

6. The subject of tropical medicine is much exploited at present. There is. much talk of teaching and research. For these purposes the colonies contributed £3,075 in 1907. There are many congresses, committees, and conferences (as for instance those on sleeping sickness, which, though a terrible disease, cannot be compared in prevalence and importance with malaria). Yet when the cause and methods of prevention of the most important of tropical diseases-perhaps of all diseases have been discovered, taught, and tried for nearly ten years, no real action is to follow, and we have nothing better to show than such a list of futilities as that which has been presented in the report of the Advisory Committee. Of what use is it to make discoveries if, when they are made, they are to be neglected?

7. Nevertheless, the reports which you originally asked for have done good. Still more good will be done if they are required every year: and especially if more exact particulars are demanded in a manner which will not admit of perfunctory reply. But, ultimately, I am quite sure that little will be accomplished in most of the Colonies unless the heads of the Medical Departments can be made to under- stand that if they do not exert themselves in this line they will suffer. Many of the reports referred to above suggest simply that the writers are unfit for their posts.

8. To conclude, I have so long incurred unpopularity for insisting on these

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points that I do not fear to incur more. I see on the one hand the infinite misery caused by the disease, and, on the other hand, well-paid officials who from sloth, ignorance, or jealousy do not undertake the simple measures which can easily be undertaken almost everywhere; and I feel it my duty to say what I have to say. It is, especially, a melancholy fact to me that my own countrymen should have been so much outpaced by the Americans and the French in obtaining practical results from my researches of 1892-99. It is evidence of nothing else but decadence in administrative ability.

The Right Honourable Colonel Seely, C.B., M.P.

29107

No. 43. QUEENSLAND.

Believe me, &c.,

RONALD ROSS.

THE DEPUTY GOVERNOR to THE SECRETARY OF STATE. (Received 10 August, 1908.)

(No. 36.) MY LORD,

Government House, Brisbane, Queensland, 29 June, 1908. WITH reference to the telegraphic despatches of His Excellency the Governor and myself, dated the 13th and 27th instant,† respectively, relative to the proposed Australian School of Tropical Medicine at Townsville, I have the honour to forward herewith copies of two letters which have been received from the Acting Premier on the subject.

I have sent a copy of this despatch to the Governor-General.

MY LORD,

I have, &c.,

ARTHUR MORGAN,

Deputy Governor.

Enclosure 1 in No. 43.

Chief Secretary's Office, Brisbane, 3 June, 1908. ACKNOWLEDGING the receipt from Your Excellency of Your Excellency's letter of the 28th ultimo, accompanied by a copy of a cable which Your Excellency has received from the Secretary of State for the Colonies on the subject of the proposed Australian Institute of Tropical Medicine at Townsville, I have the honour to inform Your Excellency that while the Premier agreed with the idea of contributing £250 annually to the proposed institution, he demurred to the change which was sub- sequently made in the constitution of the body which was to administer its affairs, and withheld decisive action in the matter until he had conferred with the Federal Prime Minister in Melbourne. Mr. Kidston has not yet informed me of the result of that interview, but I have cabled to him in London on the matter, and as soon as I receive a reply thereto, I shall do myself the honour to communicate it to Your Excellency.

His Excellency

The Governor of Queensland, Brisbane.

MY LORD,

I have, &c.,

A. H. BARLOW,

Enclosure 2 in No. 43.

Acting Chief Secretary.

Chief Secretary's Office, Brisbane, 26 June, 1908. CONTINUING my letter of the 3rd instant relative to the proposed Australian School of Tropical Medicine at Townsville, I have the honour to append hereto a translation of a telegraphic despatch which has been received from the Premier. and to inform Your Excellency that I have forwarded a copy of the same message

* Recorder.

† No. 36.