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Show GOVERNMENT IN EARNEST ABOUT The government has made studies of mothers and babies in both city and country. I neight rural areas, representing represent-ing six states, inforation was secured about the confinement care of the mothers moth-ers of 2978 babies. It was found that only five cases received prenatal care ap-roaching ap-roaching the minimum standard of "adequate" "ade-quate" are outlined by the Child Welfare Conference, held in Washington, D. C, in May, 1919; and in 80 per cent of the cases the mothers reported having had no prenatal pre-natal care whatever. Of more than 22,000 city babies studied by the government, and (representing every ev-ery type of home in seven cities, more than three-fifths were born into families where the father's earnings were below the amount which was at that time the minimum or providing the bare necessities necessi-ties of existence. Only one in ten was in a family where the father's earnings reached a fair minimu for comfort-Mothers comfort-Mothers and babies are the same in the country and in the city. They need the same cafre. The government, through the provisions provi-sions of the Sheppard-Towner bill, would help the farm woman and the city woman whether the difficulty be ignorance, isolation, iso-lation, ill health, or low income, by educating edu-cating her in maternal and infant hygiene, hy-giene, by sending out public health nibses, nibs-es, by providing health centers, and . by going .50-50 with the states in the cost for this care. |