State

.NR Volume I Number 37 THE STATE A Weekly Survey of North Carolina February 10 1934 Entered м •ecosd-fliii m»tter, June J, 1933. »t the Po*IofRc« it Releljh, Narth Oirolln». under the Aet of M.rch 3. 1879 Hundreds of North Carolina Mothers Die Needlessly BY CHARLOTTE STORY PERKINSON IF I were able to exert a great and potential per¬ sonal influence or could wield my pen mightily, there arc three things which I would like above all others to help to bring to pass in North Carolina be¬ fore I die. The first would be to abolish capital punishment, the second to bring about a great reduction in the maternal and infancy death rate, and the third to place a free public library within the reach of every citi¬ zen of the State. It is aliout the second of these ob¬ jectives I would write at this time. My thinking along this line was again stimulated recently by the statement of a certain prominent physician who said that there is one county in North Carolina having the highest maternity and infancy death rate in the world. Death Rote Too High The maternal death rate in North Carolina is 30 per cent higher than in the registration area of the United States as a whole, and higher than that of those countries from which data is available. Even so, there arc some Southern states whose rates are higher than ours. Doubtless there are many countries like India and China, from which data is not available, whose rate is very much higher, but whose state of civilization is such as not to bo comparable with that of America, or even with that of Sweden and Denmark and England and Can¬ ada, whose maternal death rates arc considerably lower than ours. We could easily become lost in a labyrinth of statistics and med¬ ical terms, so briefly let me state that the rate of death of mothers OF rather alarming proportions is North Caro¬ lina's maternity death rate. Much higher than the national average. Hundreds of deaths could be overted annually through proper care and attention, but nothing much is being done in this connection. And so, our mothers are con¬ tinuing to die needlessly. in North Carolina is 8.5 per 1,000 live births as compared to a rate of 6.5 in the United States as a whole. Mony Dcoths Prcventoble Hut the fact which is most startling, is that a large per cent of these deaths are not from septicemia, commonly known as blood poisoning, and bear¬ ing a close relation to what used to be called “child bed fever," but are due to toxemia or poisons in the sys¬ tem. It is all the more lamentable be¬ cause death from this cause in at least 90 per cent of the cases is preventable, provided the woman gets medical at¬ tention early in her pregnancy. The doctor who answers a call after labor begins is practicing inid-wifery and not obstetrics, according to one well known physician's opinion. He can help in case of an accident, perhaps, but there is little he can do to save the life of a woman whose system is thoroughly poisoned from any of a number of causes. Frown on Midwifery Because the maternity death rate is twiee ns high among negroes as among white women, and because a majority •if negro women and a large number nf white women are attended by mid¬ wives, and not by doctors, one who takes just a casual glance at the situa¬ tion might say that a first step in re¬ ducing the mother mortal¬ ity would be to make the practice of midwifery il¬ legal. Such would be a consum¬ mation devoutly to be wished, but not until we have a much better aroused public opinion on the sub¬ ject, and not until our doc¬ tors are more willing to assume the great added responsibility which such a law would entail. Perhaps not until the State is willing to pay a physician as much ns $25 a case, provided the family is unable or in cases or great ignorance, unwilling to do so. And why not ? We pay to save our farm animals, and the government is doing any number of things which a few years ago would have seemed very so¬ cialistic. Why not save human life? Is it loss important than animal life or less valuable than property? Cooperation Asked Dr. Cooper, who is doing anything in his power to reduce the infant and maternal death and is asking the co¬ operation of the citizens of the State and especially of the leaders among our women in providing competent, pre-natal medical service for those women who for one reason or another do not receive it, says that probably the primary cause of the high rate is the prevalent notion that child bear¬ ing is a natural process and that death from such a cause is but the w’ill of God. Somehow or other when legislatures and county commissioners begin a pro¬ gram of economy, so called, they al¬ ways start in to save money by cut¬ ting down appropriations to the Boards of Health and Welfare, whose business {Continued on page twenty)