Is the Parliamentary Secretary withdrawing his amendment?
Public Health Bill, 1945—Committee (Resumed).
Debate resumed on amendment No. 121:—
I had not intended. When I moved to report progress last evening I had been explaining to the House the new section which it is proposed to insert before Section 21. On reconstruction, as between the original Section 21 and Section 19, we have set out in the new Section 21 provision for dealing with verminous conditions as such. In that way we propose to provide in the Statute the facilities and the powers in relation to verminous conditions that were vested in the Minister formerly under his powers to make regulations. There has been on this question of vermin, and the provision it is proposed making to deal with it, a good deal of misunderstanding, to put it at its best. I leave it at that. That misunderstanding might be set out under two headings, (1) as to the powers we possess in relation to it at the present time, and (2) as to the seriousness of that particular problem from the public health point of view. Again, adverting to Section 148 of the Public Health Act, 1878, the Minister is given power from time to time to make, alter and revoke such regulations as may to him seem fit, with a view to the treatment of infectious diseases, the prevention of the spreading of infectious diseases, and so on, and, under that power, from time to time regulations have been made, in particular in regard to typhus fever to deal with the matter of disinfestation, and under the regulations that have been mentioned more than once in the course of the debate on this Bill, provision is made for the compulsory removal of contacts, and for the compulsory disinfestation of themselves and their clothing.
There are things that might be said in relation to this problem that one would prefer not to say, and that I believe it ought not to be necessary to say. Consequently, I feel that on this subject I must speak with a certain amount of restraint. I will tell you why. I do not want to offer material to critics of our people, particularly, those outside this State, who would like to refer to us as the dirty Irish. We are as clean, perhaps, as our neighbours but, at any rate, there is information at my disposal of a reliable and convincing character that this is a problem that must be faced, and must be faced with the determination to try to solve it. As to whether this is the best way of doing that, we can afford to have difference of opinion, but it is intended to be a sincere and earnest effort deal with that difficult and delicate problem. Let me at this point make this offer. If any Deputy belonging to any Party has any doubt as to the extent of this problem, I would very much welcome an opportunity of placing certain confidential evidence at his disposal that I should not like to place on public record. The knowledge of this problem comes to me from two sources—the reports of our school medical officers and our experience in the running of a health embarkation scheme under which people who propose to secure employment in a neighbouring country have to be medically examined and certified as being in a cleanly and healthy condition. By the very nature of things, school medical reports on this matter are not entirely reliable and they do not in fact give a true reflection of the position. The reason again is clear enough. We have not any powers of compulsory examination of school children at the present time, and we are advised by our county medical officers of health that on the day of the medical inspection a big proportion of the most highly infested children do not present themselves for examination.
If that is in fact the position, the reports of our school medical officers in the matter of infestation do not give us a true picture of the degree and extent of infestation. It is a somewhat different matter in the health embarkation scheme because there is no evasion there. I have been receiving monthly reports from the medical officer in charge of that scheme for a number of years and the reports have conveyed to me that this is a very serious matter indeed and that it is one that the responsible Minister must tackle and endeavour to solve.
Coming away from the question of personal hygiene and the facts that the enemies of our people would like to seize on to humiliate us, let us briefly examine the matter purely from the public health point of view. Let me remind the House that in the proposed new section placed before them, in response to the representations that were made to me in the House and outside of it, and in the realisation that from the public health point of view there was only a certain limited set of vermin that caused us serious concern, the restrictions that we are imposing and the powers that we are taking relate only to the three types of lice that are set out in the amendment. We need not mind about their high-sounding description, a louse is a louse for all that. There are three classes of lice there with which we are all familiar— the head louse, the body louse and the other "boy".
Speak for yourself.
As a medical man I would be familiar with them, apart from any other knowledge but I think we have seen the varieties of them that walk about, at any rate, even those of us who have been brought up under the most sheltered conditions. There are two infectious diseases immediately associated with the species of lice that are referred to in this section. There is the disease called impetigo contagioso—a very high-sounding name— but you have seen children with that terrible condition of the scalp—scabs and running sores. You have seen children bring those sores out all over their bodies. You have seen it. You have observed some of the physical consequences of it. You cannot have been blind, even as laymen. How are we to remedy that if we do not get rid of the louse? There is the other more serious and deadly and dreadful disease, the disease of typhus. It may be difficult, I am sure it is, for laymen to grasp the full significance of these matters, but no medical man living, whether he belongs to the small minority of cranks who were mentioned in this House last night, or to any other section of medical thought, no medical man who ever got his degrees will challenge the statement that the louse, and the louse alone, is the cause of typhus fever in this country. Consequently we find ourselves in this position. If we can plan to eliminate the louse we, at any rate, remove one threat and danger that hangs over our people. There is no question about it. If we eliminate lice, we are finished with typhus fever in this country. In many civilised countries typhus fever has already disappeared, but it has not disappeared here. Do not let Deputies tell me that we only have an occasional case of typhus fever in this country.
I was going to tell you that.
I presume you will; I wish you would not. So long as typhus fever is even endemic in this country, so long is there a potential danger hanging over our people if they remain infested. I may be told that we only have had occasional outbreaks. Thanks be to God; the Almighty has been very good to us if we have not had devastating outbreaks, because all the setting is there. Deputies may think that, because we have not had these devastating outbreaks of typhus fever, there is not any real danger or any well-founded cause for apprehension. I wish they were right; I dearly wish that that were the position. But, as certain as I am addressing this House, it is not the position and I have a definite responsibility in regard to it.
I have always tried my best when dealing with scientific or semi-scientific subjects, to put things as clearly to the layman as it is possible to put them. In relation to this typhus fever business—and the louse is the vector—it is an acknowledged scientific fact that persons living in an endemic area who have acquired a substantial degree of natural immunity but who are infested and who go to another area where the soil is virgin and deposit their lice there, without anybody knowing that these persons ever have had typhus fever or without their knowing it themselves, can initiate an outbreak. It has happened. We have, fortunately, through the excellent organisation of our public health services, been able to control the various outbreaks of typhus fever which have taken place in this country in recent years. Will I be asked to wait before taking precautions to eliminate one, at any rate, from the public health problems that we can eliminate; or will I be given power to do what some Deputies pleaded with me to do during the course of this debate, to try to prevent disease rather than wait until disease is contracted and then try to cure it?
This is essentially a preventive measure. It is true that in 1944 we had only nine cases of typhus fever and only one death. Does it matter if we have escaped with nine cases, that we have brought that dreadful disease about nine households and that only one person died? Is it something to disregard? We are particularly vulnerable at the present time because of the degree of infestation and because there are many people returning to this country who have been out of it for some years and who have been in typhus areas outside this country. I can solemnly assure you that those whose responsibility it is to safeguard the health of the community are concerned and are anxious.
About January, 1944, I personally discussed this matter at a conference of county medical officers of health. That is very recent history. They were as anxious about it as I was. But we were in this position: we saw no remedy for it. The older methods of disinfestation were tedious, costly and unsatisfactory, and the particular preparations that had a certain reputation as to their effectiveness were not available. We talked about it; we sympathised with one another; it was about all we could do. But medical science has, even in that short period, come to our rescue and now we are in the position that we can remove this infestation from the most highly infested human being in this country in a matter of hours. We would be wanting in our duty, having got that remedy, if we failed to avail of that remedy and to place that remedy at the disposal of our people and say: "You can rid yourselves of this infestation in a matter of hours. It is your bounden duty to your family and to your neighbours that you should do it"? I think it is reasonable. I think I ought to get the support of this House, I think I ought to get the support of any enlightened community in trying to bring about that condition that is so easily brought about.
Perhaps I might develop a point that must be obvious in this type of debate. I am sure it is necessary, because one does not know in advance whether his statement will be subjected to carping criticism or whether people will be merely looking for information with the fixed and only purpose of trying to help in achieving a desirable objective. But do not tell me again that we are going to keep people at home from Mass. Do not tell me again that the right of freedom of worship is going to be interfered with. Do not tell me that we are interfering here with the right of the parent to send his children to schoolor to Mass or himself to go about freely and gaily in an infested condition. All those arguments would have force and weight if the remedy were not at hand. In advance of that type of criticism and in the hope that it will not again be pursued in this House, I want to emphasise that the remedy is there and that it is certain. To the layman, its results would appear to be miraculous. We are taking steps to ensure that that remedy will be made available to every human being in this State who requires it. Already, an explanatory pamphlet has been drawn up which we hope to circulate to every household. It sets out how this new preparation called D.D.T. is to be used against the different types of lice referred to in this section. There is a powder to be used in relation to one or two groups and an emulsion to be used in the case of the head. Incidentally, I might mention that, when D.D.T. was not available to the civil population of any country in Europe—I do not want to boast but people should know what is to our credit, as they are so often told what is to our discredit—we showed our initiative, had D.D.T. manufactured in this country and made available, if not in sufficient supply, in considerable supply, for the civil population.
We have already secured an option at a very reduced figure on sufficient D.D.T., both in powder and in emulsion, completely to disinfest every infested person in this country on the basis of the percentage figures we have been enabled to work out by our experience of the problem. In order that nobody should be deterred on the ground of expense, it is being made available free of charge. In that setting, I do not think that anybody is justified in refusing to rid himself of these lice. Unless we make an organised and concentrated attack upon this problem, we cannot succeed. Children who have been brought up under the most rigid supervision, and under the best hygienic conditions, go to school or to a cinema or even to a place of worship and bring home the infestation, as a result of which the rest of the family become infested. That is the experience of parents in every class of the community. We can remedy it. It is one of the things through which we can see plenty of daylight. Far-reaching as these powers may appear to be, there is no reason in the world why they should inflict any hardship on any well-meaning citizen. The remedy is there and, if he is not prepared to pay for the remedy, he will get it free of cost. I do not know that I can make the position any clearer than I have made it or that I can impress the House with the seriousness of this type of problem if the House is not in the mood to be impressed.
I appeal again for co-operation. If we get the co-operation of all Parties in this matter, we shall achieve success. Do not assume that, without the power to compel people to do things, you can achieve success. That applies in every sphere of life. Deputies might as well have told the Minister for Agriculture during the recent emergency that this, being an agricultural country, and we being blessed with an abundance of arable land, sufficient food would be raised by the people not only for their own requirements, but to provide an exportable surplus. They would not do it. Do not let anybody say I am criticising those concerned. I am merely asking the House to realise that compulsory tillage became necessary notwithstanding that we had the land and that we had men who knew how to work the land.
We had the attitude "We will be all right". The same thing applies in this case. The vast bulk of those concerned will shrug their shoulders and say: "We will be all right; we have not had an epidemic of typhus for a long time. We may have impetigo, but everybody gets that, and there is no need to take these steps". I believe there is need. I am very firmly convinced that there is danger. I should be lacking in my duty if I did not warn the House that danger exists and that I think I can cope with that danger. I ask the co-operation of the House in my efforts to deal with it.
I welcome the exhaustive statement made by the Parliamentary Secretary on this proposed new sub-section. If I have any regret in connection with the matter, it is that he did not give us the benefit of his knowledge of those matters to the same extent on other sections. The Parliamentary Secretary has painted a picture which seems to indicate that the situation with which we are dealing is more serious now than it has been in the past. To put the matter in plain language, the people of this country are more verminous at present than they have been in the past. I should like to know if that is so.
What I meant to convey was that we have evidence of it which was not available to us in the past.
I do not believe that any member of the House will deny to the Parliamentary Secretary any powers which, he can establish to the satisfaction of the House, are necessary to deal with this matter.
He said in the beginning of his statement that there was a great deal of misunderstanding in this country as to what we meant when we talk about people being in a verminous state. There is and, mind you, that misunderstanding or that particular view is not confined to laymen. I have reason to be interested in this particular section. The definition of "verminous" on one occasion cost me or rather cost, I am proud to be able to say, my constituents as the result of a verdict in the courts, something over £1,200. What gave rise to that? The county medical officer of health goes into a convent school, a new building with a very large number of children on the rolls, children drawn from all classes but mainly from an urban area, and that medical officer states in his reports that in some of the classes as high as 95 per cent. of the children were verminous according to his definition. It is not necessary for me to say that that was not accepted by the parents, and it certainly was not accepted by myself, who had personal knowledge of the many homes from which these children came, who knew the conditions under which they were reared and the standard of personal cleanliness there. The fact that it was not accepted by the people generally was borne out afterwards.
I want to know whether the very serious, the terribly serious picture which has been painted by the Parliamentary Secretary in relation to lice gives an actual and completely true presentation of the position in this country to-day or are we to attribute a certain amount of exaggeration due to over-zeal to have this matter dealt with? I am not for a moment trying to minimise the dangers. The Parliamentary Secretary talked about the danger of making ammunition which could be used by outside enemies of this country and, mind you, while he was anxious, I am quite sure, not to do that, I do not think that either from inside or outside the country has such a picture ever been painted before of the standard of the personal cleanliness of our people as has been painted by the Parliamentary Secretary himself this morning.
If we are to judge by the powers which are sought, the position must be a very serious one. The Parliamentary Secretary is satisfied that if he gets the powers sought in this sub-section, that with these powers and D.D.T. he has a complete and certain remedy. I should like to be able to believe that. People do not go round infested with lice because there is any pleasure to be derived from it. I do not know that anyone can conceive any more troublesome or more irritating travelling companions and there must be some reason for it. People do not usually inflict torture on themselves. They do not usually allow to remain on their bodies, in their homes or in their clothes, something that can be removed easily. I think we have got to go down a bit deeper for the cause and I think it is going to require more than D.D.T. and the powers sought in this section, even if they were fully operated or could be operated.
The state described by the Parliamentary Secretary can come about, in my opinion, from two sources and two sources only. One is gross negligence, carelessness and a complete absence of any idea of personal cleanliness. The other is the economic conditions in which the people have to live. This is a serious matter and, being a serious matter, should be treated in a serious and frank way. There are none of us children. There were very few of us reared with silver spoons in our mouths and some of us have been brought up in very close contact with people who have lived in very great poverty. I want to know from the Parliamentary Secretary how he is going to eradicate conditions in this country in which you have anything from one to ten, 12 or 14 people living, eating and sleeping in one room, where you have most of these people wearing the same underclothes anyway, for 24 hours in the day. When the end of the day comes and when they want to turn into a bed on which there is very little covering, they have not clothes to replace the clothes which they have been wearing all day during the heat and sweat of work.
Let us talk about this matter as it really is. Is it not well-known—and it is not confined to the City of Dublin or even to the urban areas; it is true even of the rural areas—that very often some of the clothes worn by people during the day have to be thrown over them at night to keep them warm? I want the Parliamentary Secretary to tell me whether under this or any other section there is anything that is going to remedy that state of affairs. He said a moment ago that this was a purely preventive section, that it was to prevent so-and-so happening. You may completely disinfest a person and a person's clothes to-day; put him back into the same conditions again, and where are you? Remember, there are thousands and thousands of people—it was true even of normal times, and how much more so was it true during the last five years, having regard not only to the scarcity but to the high cost of clothes—who have not a single change of clothes? Is there anybody in this House so far removed from the actual living conditions of our unfortunate people that they do not know that is the position? I want to say that I believe that if our people have not the ways and means, they certainly have the desire to attain as high a standard of personal cleanliness as the people of any other civilised country in the world. Where they have the means and the way, they certainly attain and maintain that standard, but again when we come down to questions of hygiene, of sanitation, of the ordinary means at their disposal, the ordinary facilities that will enable them for parts of the year to do more than wash their faces and heads, we may ask what percentage of our homes even to-day, of even our new homes built within the last ten, 15 or 24 years, can boast of having a bath installed?
The Parliamentary Secretary wants us to be realists about this matter and I agree it ought to be attacked in a real way. Let us attack it in a real way and let us realise what the conditions are. Let us make up our minds to this, that, in so far as our people are verminous, they are verminous not because of any wish or desire of theirs to be verminous, not because they do not wish to be as clean in their persons as any other people, but simply because the conditions under which they are forced to live and exist will not enable them to keep clean. We know that it is a problem. We know quite well that when children who are fortunate enough to live in fairly well-equipped homes, who are fortunate enough to be the children of parents with a fairly decent income and who therefore can afford to look after them from the point of view of personal cleanliness and from the point of view of their clothes and the necessary frequent changes of clothing, go into our schools, our churches, our cinemas or theatres, they will become infected.
It is not because the father or mother live in a labourer's cottage, or in one room in a tenement in the City of Dublin, rather than in a five, six or ten-roomed house that they are not just as anxious to have their children clean as the fathers and mothers living in the ten-roomed houses. I am not satisfied, that even with this new provision, the Parliamentary Secretary is going the right way about dealing with this matter. I have been informed that, as the Parliamentary Secretary said at the beginning, certain reports based upon examinations amongst certain people, particularly in certain parts of the country, have disclosed a very serious state of affairs. I doubt if all the powers now sought by the Parliamentary Secretary will completely eradicate these conditions, and what I say about this section and about the proposed remedies could, I think, be said about nearly every other section of the Bill.
The Parliamentary Secretary smiles, but it is quite true. It is notorious that a person suffering from T.B., being taken in time, goes into a sanatorium, spends three or four months there and then is sent home cured, but he is sent back to the same home and the same conditions which were originally responsible for his contracting the disease. You may deal with them under this section; you may forcibly treat them; you may remove every louse on their bodies or in their clothes, but so long as these children, and even these adults, have to go back to live under the same miserable conditions, you will have to keep on doing it, and I am afraid you will never completely rid our people of them.
In opening the debate, the Parliamentary Secretary spent a good deal of time battering at an open door. So far as this House generally is concerned, all Deputies are unanimous that, so far as possible, it should be the aim of our medical authorities and of the people generally to see that vermin are eliminated completely. On that question, we are all in complete agreement, and I think it would be foolish to suggest that there was any opposition in any part of the House to measures which might be considered necessary and desirable to achieve this object, provided the measures are reasonable and justifiable. In all my long career, I have never met an individual who was partial to, or tolerant of, lice, except one, and he happened to be a poet. I distinctly remember a habit he had of picking an insect off his person, putting it on the back of his hand and then blowing it off, saying: "I would hate to kill the poor creature". I mention that as the one exception that proves the rule.
Since we all agree on this aspect, it is a matter for us to decide how best to achieve the object we have in view, and I am personally in complete agreement with Deputy Morrissey when he says that a raising of the standard of living of our people, an improvement of our housing conditions and of the ability of our people to secure decent facilities for washing and general cleanliness and the provision of sufficient means to provide a change of clothing are of vital and, as I think, primary importance. In dealing with the amendment, we have to accept a good deal of what the Parliamentary Secretary tells us, because most of us are laymen and he is a medical officer, but I have a growing feeling of fear in my mind that, by the time this Bill has wended its way through the House, most of us will be qualified to take our degrees in medical science of some kind or another.
You will be able to do first-aid, anyhow.
I hope not, because I trust we shall be able to make greater progress than we have been making. We are all becoming a little anxious about getting out to put in the crop for the coming year. While it is a good thing to eliminate vermin, it would be a very serious position for the country if the people were left without food.
In regard to our reliance on the Parliamentary Secretary's technical knowledge, it is necessary to compare this new section with that which it seeks to supersede. I mentioned at another stage of this debate that this new section is a definite improvement upon the one which it supersedes. It is certainly much less absurd. It may be a little more pediculous, but it certainly is not so ridiculous. In the first draft, we were confining our compulsory powers to children, as if it were only a louse which inhabited the body of a child could spread this disease. Apparently the Parliamentary Secretary, in drafting the section, was ignoring the fact that a louse sheltering, perhaps, between the permanent waves on the head of a fair lady could be as dangerous to the public health as an insect on the head of a small boy.
The Parliamentary Secretary has learned something since he introduced the Bill in its original form. He has realised also that, since it is lice and lice alone which spread infection, it is unwise and would be imprudent to have his medical officers chasing all other kinds of insects and thus waste a lot of public time and money. The fact that he has made such an advance and has had to make such changes in the original section gives us reason to have certain doubts. It is admitted now that he was not infallible when he introduced the Bill. Are we to assume that the gift of infallibility descended on him between the Second Reading and the introduction of this amendment? If we accept the view that it did, there is no need for further discussion, but if we do not consider that he is absolutely infallible we should question various methods which are proposed in this new section.
One thing admitted by the Parliamentary Secretary to-day was significant, that is, that in the medical profession there is a number of cranks. It is well to get that admission from a member of the medical profession. We have to be very careful to guard against the crank. In this section as it stands, I think there is no danger to the ordinary citizen if every person called upon to administer the Act is absolutely impartial and fair at all times and acts with absolute prudence. If we could rely upon that, we might be prepared to give the section to the Parliamentary Secretary without any further consideration. There are very drastic provisions in it and a very roundabout procedure. The Parliamentary Secretary has dwelt a good deal upon the fact that medical science has made an extraordinary step forward in the past 12 months. He referred to D.D.T. as miraculous. If we have discovered this miraculous method of eliminating vermin, it should not be necessary to have such a roundabout procedure as is contemplated in this section, of a person being refused permission to expose himself on the street, of a registered medical practitioner attending a person in a dwelling and being aware that some person is infected with vermin in that house, being obliged to report to the district medical officer. With the new remedy, it should not be necessary to have all this reporting and isolation.
Might I point out to the Deputy that the private practitioner, under the section to which the Deputy is referring, is given seven days within which to clear up the condition, before he has to report it—and he can clear it up in less than seven hours?
That is the point I am considering at the moment. We have discovered a new method of eliminating this type of evil and, therefore, we should be more careful about putting these excessive powers into the hands of the medical profession. I would also warn the Parliamentary Secretary against undue enthusiasm being aroused in the medical profession by reason of this new discovery. From time to time in medical history new discoveries have been brought to light and immediately hailed as complete remedies for particular evils. Time has proved that they were not so miraculous, so far-reaching or so beneficial as was at first thought. It ought to be, and I am sure it will be, the policy of the Department to treat this new remedy with care. I am sure the most painstaking research will be undertaken to ensure that it has no ill-effects on human health or otherwise, as that is but an elementary precaution.
In the very opening words of this new section there is a sweeping provision. It says:—
"A person who knows that he is verminous shall not expose himself in any street, public place, club, hotel or shop."
Let us look a little distantly to the future and see, perhaps, a Minister for Health performing his toilet in the morning, dressing his hair and discovering one of these insects, the pediculus capitis, and finding he has not one of the remedies in the house. He may not be a medical officer, but he may be a very conscientious Minister. What is he to do?
Drown him.
That must be why the Deputy is in favour of the amendment.
I am just wondering what precaution the Minister for Health in this case has to take, if he is not to be completely isolated and cut off from all his public duties and debarred from leaving his home until he has satisfied his conscience that this particular insect and all his relatives and friends have been exterminated. I think it was Oliver Goldsmith who put it on record that a louse becomes a grandparent before he reaches the age of 24 hours. I do not know how he discovered that. Medical science may have made some little advance since then and may contradict the statement of Oliver Goldsmith, but it is admitted that vermin reproduce very rapidly. I think it would be impossible for any person to be absolutely certain, if he were to discover vermin in his home or on his person, that he was absolutely free. Then, by this first sub-section, he would be debarred from moving in public and forced to isolate himself completely. That is unnecessarily drastic, in view of the advance which medical science has made and the new remedies which have been discovered.
We should be careful about adopting such drastic measures. We know that in some of the totalitarian States they had the same enthusiasm for activity against vermin. We know that, in some of those States, one of the methods of publicly humiliating those who were not loyal to the totalitarian régime was to have them publicly deloused. Anything which reflects upon the dignity of the human person and anything which imposes a humiliation on the individual should be handled with extreme care and no undue publicity should be given to any measures which it may be necessary to adopt in order to eliminate vermin. Therefore, we should see that the methods to be adopted should be as simple and as forthright as possible and there should be the least element of officialdom and red tape or the filling up of forms and the making of declarations in connection with the matter.
We know that there may be—and I think there are—a limited number of people who suffer from this evil by reason of their own neglect, but in the great majority of cases it is due to extreme poverty. In quite a considerable number of cases it might be due also, in addition to extreme poverty, to physical incapacity. There are many cases in the country of aged people, perhaps living alone, or there may be two or three people living in the same house, suffering from rheumatism or other troubles which would make it difficult for them frequently to change their clothing. Those people become affected. I think that type of person should not be publicly humiliated. That is the point I wish to stress.
We all know of a recent case, a very shocking case, in which a poor person was found dead and the view was expressed that that person was infested with vermin. These things will happen, and it is not always due to neglect. We must take the view that physical incapacity and sickness are contributing causes, but the greatest contributing causes are extreme poverty, which makes it impossible for people to change their clothing frequently, and also lack of housing, which deprives people of facilities for bathing and cleanliness.
In that portion of the speech of the Parliamentary Secretary that I happened to hear I was impressed with the reference to the effects of infestation and the necessity for steps to be taken to remove that type of affliction. I did not, however, hear any explanation from the Parliamentary Secretary as to the causes of infestation. I made inquiries from a colleague to know if it was referred to by the Parliamentary Secretary in the earlier portion of his speech, and I gather it was not. It is the general opinion that the causes of infestation are mainly poverty and bad housing conditions. Obviously, the remedy would be to remove poverty and ensure that every individual has housing conditions of such a character as will enable the members of the household to maintain a standard of personal cleanliness through the amenities which the better housing will provide. Until that desirable state of affairs is reached, until poverty has been removed from our social sphere and until we have the housing conditions that we desire, I think it is evident that our people, particularly those in one room tenements and habitations of that description, will have to undergo a considerable amount of discomfort, which may be transmitted to others.
I think that commonsense would compel us to adopt any remedy, even though it may be a temporary remedy, to ensure that that discomfort should be removed from that type of person and, if the remedy suggested here in the form of D.D.T. or any other preparation gives a measure of comfort to our people, particularly in slums or other such habitations, I think it would be exceedingly foolish if we did not take advantage of a course of treatment along those lines. For that reason, I and my colleagues take the view that, while the ideal thing would be to remove the causes, if the causes are poverty and bad housing conditions, meanwhile we must not turn aside something that is at hand which gives a measure of comfort in the conditions of living that our people have to undergo in insanitary dwellings.
I find it difficult to understand the Parliamentary Secretary, but I find it even more difficult to understand Deputy Cogan when he sees something valuable in this measure. I wonder if I understand Deputy O'Sullivan aright when he says that, in order to save people the inconvenience of being infested, he thinks it right that we should take powers to prevent people who are infested going upon the public street? I think it is a very shocking and drastic approach to the task of making people comfortable.
The Parliamentary Secretary harped on the necessity for powers as drastic as these in order to prevent people being troubled by the disease of typhus and impetigo. As regards typhus, at the same time as the Parliamentary Secretary is taking power compulsorily to disinfest people infested with lice and to take power to punish them if they go out on the street or into a public place while so infested, in the same measure he is wiping out compulsory vaccination. From his own statement, in the case of any danger of an outbreak of typhus fever you can take all the necessary precautions to prevent that spreading beyond the infected cases much more simply than you can take precautions to prevent the spread of smallpox. They had cases in Great Britain where smallpox became prevalent and there was the very confused situation where people, who took advantage of compulsory vaccination not being enforced there, were rushing to be vaccinated when the danger arrived.
The Parliamentary Secretary has told us that, if there is a case of typhus, the whole place can be cleaned up with D.D.T. inside of seven hours. This is just another example of the inconsequential way in which the Parliamentary Secretary is approaching this, and of his lack of any kind of clearly understood principles in dealing with it. With regard to typhus, which is very serious from the point of view of its incidence, the Parliamentary Secretary has indicated that science has put into the hands of the people a way of remedying the difficulties they previously laboured under because of housing, clothing or some other conditions. Science has also put into the people's hands an opportunity of completely cleaning themselves, if they so wish, of infestation by lice, and it is in these circumstances that the Parliamentary Secretary wants the very drastic powers that he is seeking in this section.
I ask Deputies to look at the last report of the Department of Local Government and Public Health, and to turn to page 40 where they will find some details with regard to typhus and of the number of cases that occurred between 1938-43. In 1938 there were none. In 1939 there were five, in 1940, 13; in 1941, 25; in 1942, 28 and in 1943, 20. The Parliamentary Secretary told us this morning that there were nine cases in 1944. The deaths from this disease were: in 1938, none; in 1939, three; in 1940, two; in 1941, six; in 1942, five and in 1943, four. The Parliamentary Secretary said this morning that in 1944 there was only one death. The report, in dealing with this matter, says that:—
"This disease has been endemic in the western counties for over a century. From time to time it was responsible for disastrous epidemics with cases sometimes numbering thousands....
From the year 1923 onwards more effective measures began to be adopted to bring the disease under efficient control. The improvement effected was largely due to the efforts of the Department and its medical staff, ably assisted by the local medical officers. Preventive measures were put on a basis which was scientific but simple and easy to operate."
That is to say that preventive measures were put on a basis that was scientific but simple and easy to operate before ever D.D.T. appeared. We see, therefore, from this report that medical science was able even during the conditions which this country laboured under during the last five or six years when there was no great chance, in some of the western districts, of buying new outfits of clothes, on the one hand, or soap on the other, to keep the incidence of the disease down. I fail to see, therefore, why there should be this extraordinary pressure at this hour of the day to pass a law saying that anybody with lice on him cannot go on a public road, that he cannot go into a public place, that he cannot go into a church, and that children cannot be sent to school. I think that in spite of what Deputy Cogan may have at the back of his mind, and in spite of what Deputy O'Sullivan has said, the Parliamentary Secretary's proposal is quite fantastic. On page 42 of the Department's report we find this:—
"The efforts to eradicate the disease were fruitful and for the first time there was no case of typhus fever recorded in the country in the year 1938. With the existence of emergency conditions outbreaks of the disease have again occurred and the number of cases increased from five in the year 1939 to 28 in the year 1942. A slight decrease has been noted in the year under review when there were only two outbreaks involving 20 cases and four deaths, compared with four outbreaks resulting in 28 cases and five deaths in the preceding year. Only two counties, Leitrim and Cork, were affected in 1943. The Leitrim outbreak was by far the more serious of the two, resulting in 19 out of the 20 cases and three out of the four deaths. It occurred amongst itinerant tinkers encamped near Carrick-on-Shannon, but who had previous contacts in their wanderings through other parts of the country. The extent of the outbreak was due to the fact that at the outset the disease was not clinically recognisable as typhus fever being of a mild type, and was diagnosed as influenza. In County Cork there was only one case...the patient succumbed. It is significant that in several instances in recent years the disease has been spread by itinerants and it may be necessary to obtain more power by legislation to ensure that the standard of cleanliness amongst that class will be improved."
That report was printed for the Department of Local Government and Public Health in January, 1946, the report having been signed in December, 1945, by the Secretary to the Department. The Minister for Local Government and Public Health and the Secretary speaking for the Department, with all its experience, reported that "it is significant that in several instances in recent years the disease has been spread by itinerants and it may be necessary to obtain more power by legislation to ensure that the standard of cleanliness amongst that class will be improved."
The Deputy will have all this on Report again.
I think the Parliamentary Secretary is tending to become unreasonable. He said here this morning that without power to compel people to do things that you cannot succeed.
The Deputy can talk away until he is tired.
I was sent here to do so.
And you are certainly doing it.
I am leading up to this, that I do not know what is going on inside the Department of Local Government and Public Health. Yesterday, we on this side of the House were charged with being, more or less, slaves: that there were British Acts, the Act of 1878 and others, with all kinds of powers in them, and that we never asked anybody what was the reason for those powers, but that when the Parliamentary Secretary came before us with this Bill we wanted to put all kinds of objectionable restrictions in his way. He more or less suggested that we are of the slave type and would take things from the foreigner that we would not take from him: that here, with this amendment in front of us, we were being offered a piece of Irish legislation, made by Irishmen for Irishmen, to deal with purely Irish conditions. But what was my surprise, almost my disappointment, when the Parliamentary Secretary told us to-day: "No, this thing which is, as it were, crawling into the Bill by way of a belated amendment, thought of for the Committee Stage, is something which has crawled out of some sections of the Public Health Act of 1878." I do not know whether the grandson that Deputy Cogan has learned about from Oliver Goldsmith would be able to recognise his grandfather, but I find it very difficult to think that anybody could recognise the amendment which the Parliamentary Secretary is now putting before us as being anything like the legitimate offspring of Section 148 of the Public Health Act of 1878.
I move to report progress.
Progress reported; Committee to sit again.