1937-10-02 — Page 11

THE CHINA MAIL, OCTOBER 2, 1957.

HEALTH & COMMON SENSE

E

BY SURGEON REAR-ADMIRAL C. M. BEADNELL

less: сод-

SON, that bold champion servants caused him at the eleventh much more accurate description of For mental freedom, once said: hour to give it a trial and be cured the human body than that in the "Live me Health and a Day, and I Just as the savage is awed by the following schoolboy howler: "At will make the pomp of emperors mumbo-jumbo incantations of the the top is the brainium in which the ridiculous." From this saying Lord medicine-man, so modern,man is in-brains are kept if there are any. Horder has chosen the title of his trigued by the truncated Latin and In the middle is the borax, which recently-delivered twelve addres. Egyptian hieroglyphics of a pre- contains the heart, stomach, and sest; and probably no other scription; in each case the atmos-lights. The lowed part is called the words could depict more vividly and phere of mystery enhances the sick abominable cavity, in which will be pathetically the importance man at man's faith and his healer's power. found the five bowels, a, e, i, o, u.” taches to his health and the depth Tell the patient the truth, that what of his longing for it when lost. In he requires are more fresh air and

We want more biological teach these addresses the author dis- fruit and fewer cigarettes and cock- cusses men and things, the rela-tails, more walking and thinking ing in school. Danger lies, not in ignorance. You cannot keep a bicy tionship between the State and and less meat and motoring, and he the little knowledge, but in the little

forth with calls in a Medicine, between doctor and pa-

ele in good order, let alone a car, unless you look after it, and you tient; the evil effects of noise, rush, scientious doctor. strain, and general wear and tear

cannot look after it if you are utter- of our modern civilisation; the chapter on Hunter gives a mostly ignorant of its mechanism. How rights and wrongs of Euthanasia; delightful picture of that great much more so then is it with the the risks of over-specialisation and anatomist with his unquenchable living human body, and with the what might well be called techno-thirst for more and ever more massed human bodies that make up The State and the in- cracy" in the treatment of the sick knowledge, and of the almost hyp-a nation. He touches upon disease with a notic influence he wielded over his dividual, for the maintenance of lightness sufficient to arouse the one-time pupil Jenner, the blue health, depend on self-knowledge; layman's interest without frighten-eyed, handsome, gay country practi- both, like a fish, go wrong at the ing him. Certain diseases, like other tioner who frittered away his days head first. Rulers and doctors are things, have their day: rickets and in riding to hounds and his even-fapt to forget that if man is a 12- chlorosis, once all the fashion, are ings in composing light verse, until tional animal he is also an emo- now declasses into their place at length, fired with the master's tional one. The appetite alike of have stepped those post-War up-spirit, he too discovered that hunt sick nations and sick men is often starts, alkalosis and neurosis. Toing after Nature's secrets is far for things that would but increase judge from dissections of four-more engrossing than the sport of the evil; in both cases two different thousand-year-old bodies, arterio-kings. Hunter was working on the espects must be faced-the body or sclerosis and tuberculosis are as heat of animals and plants, and he body-politic and the mind or mind- old as humanity itself. By the way, sent Jenner a thermometer asking politic. Nations get the Govern- was it not the recognition of the him to take the temperature of varments they deserve, and patients former disease in the big artery ous living things, from bats to get the doctors they deserve. In into which the heart of an entrees. Unfortunately Jenner broke short, to use Lord Horder's words: balmed Pharaoh once pumped its the thermometer an expensive A healthy nation tends to aerated blood that led the late Lord item in those days-but was too as happy, and a happy nation tends Moynihan to attribute literal truth hamed to confess. However, the

Towards such a to be healthy." to the Old Testament words: "God mishap reached Hunter's cars, and desirable consummation his most hardened Pharaoh's heart?”” The sent off a second instrument interesting book will greatly con-clear to it the folly of disregarding with a letter: "You are very sly, al tribute; it should be welcomed as a Nature's simplest laws. Like the though you think I cannot see it storehouse of wisdom written by a Rabbi of old, Lord Horder can-just- Alarmed by a constricted outlook I will send you another [ther-man whose objective throughout upon the mechanisation of industry, mometer], but take care those brilliant career has ever been to with its concomitant throwing of damned clumsy fingers do not break befriend the human race and make men out of work, some short-sight it also." Very characteristic again ed sociologists suggest science was the message he sent to Jenner should suspend (forgive the "apt on learning that a long interval of alliteration's artful aid") further silence on the part of his old pupil research for a decade. What is real-was due to disappointment follow- ly wanted, as Lord Horder says, is ing rejection by a wealthy lady not less science but more and bet-whose affections he had hoped to ter-applied science. The reviewer win:- would go further and add that there

is

even greater need for more 1 [am] sorry. You have two scientific thinking, not only by the passions to cope with, that of being public at large but also by many disappointed in love and that of of our scientists. We would like to being defeated; but both will wear see more' specialists with the width

out, perhaps the first socrest. of outlook of Lord Horder, who Let her go; never mind her. I shall might truthfully be described as employ you with hedgehogs... the apostle of common sense in the get a hedgehog in the middle of treatment of the sick. A good case winter and weigh him; put him in in point came to the reviewer's no your garden; then weigh him in tice not long ago. Lord Horder the spring, and see what he has was called in to see a patient who

lost.. was near death's door. He found a flushed, dry-skinned boy gasping

for breath in a small stuffy room-- The proper study of mankind is pneumonia - written all over him men, said Pope. But how little does The examination completed, the man, "the glory and shame of the physician went straight to the win-universe” Pascal called him, dow and opened it-to the mother's know of himself. There is indeed amazement. It was the lack of fresh something rotten in a system of air that was killing her son, the in-education that places knowledge

28

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Not many people could guess that the rolling indicator signs on the London buses are 45-fees long- By a mere twist of the mangie" a conductor can immediately change. the route. Over 17,000 different combinations of destinations are used on London's buses. Indicator boards were once used but to-day machines turn out 4,000 yards of these linen signs each week, as re placements are frequent. Photo: shows what a bus sign really looks like Holding out: one of the mo- dera bas sigus. (Fox Copyright).

ly say: "White me as one who loves his fellow men.”

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flux of fresh air that cured him by the doings of mythological per a SN

affording the additional energy that ages and the mistresses of defunct enabled him to call up reserve kings on a higher plane than know- forces and therewith to slay the ledge of the composition of the

grading army of microbes attack-water one drinks and of the air one

the lungs. The mentality of the breathes, of how to cook a potato average person towards illness has or bake a pie, or of the most ele- altered little since the days when Naaman angrily refused to take the prophet's advice because it was

and simple to carry out, and only the cold logic of his

ntary facts concerning the struc-

and - functions of one's own dy. It is questionable whether a iciently majority of people its well informed to provide

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