MATERNAL WELFARE

Evening Post, Volume CVIII, Issue 150, 21 December 1929, Page 11

MATERNAL WELFARE

■ST. HELENS HOSPITALS

Dr. Agues Bennett, medical officer of St. Helens Hospital, Wellington, in the course of her remarks at the meeting on Thursday, when the presentation of a memento of the late Eight Hon. B. J. Seddon, founder, of °St. Henelens hospitals, was made on behalf of Mrs. Seadon, stated that the institution -in, Wellington had been working quietly for many years. The St Helens hospitals, from their initiation had. carried^ put the. project of tho founder, who was a man of broad vision and statesmanship, and who recognised' that the taking of all possible • measures for the attainment of safe maternity was a function of the btate. Mr. Seddon recognised that tact more than twenty years ago, ana the world, as a whole, was only realising that ideal.now. The Minister of Health had stated that 28,000 mothers had benefited by the treatment and care received in the institutions, but really that number should be doubled for the work of the hospital involved attention to 28,000 little immigrants of the very best type for the State. The '• registration of Midwives Act and the establishment of St. Helens hospitals m 1903 and 1904 were followed by a marked improvement in the records of maternal welfare (as shown by the figures given by the Government (statistician), which improvement continued until the war. The indirect benefits, also, that had resulted from the. training of midwives were shown in. some- degree, at least, from the statistical records. The speaker mentioned that, while on a tour abroad recently,, inquiring into obstetrical matters in other countries, medical men expressed to her great interest ana surprise that in Now Zealand State maternity hospitals had existed for many years.