Harvard School of Public Health - Yearbook (Cambridge, MA)

Page 28 text:

T here is now an increased opportunity to see whether well planned programs which mobilize the capabilities of physicians, nurses, and social workers can effec¬ tively extend the best of maternity and infant health care among the population which suffers from urban medical blight.” This opportunity exists because of the new pro¬ gram of maternity and infant care projects authorized by Congress, under the direction of the Children’s Bureau. When the infant mortality rate in one health district of a city is more than 21 2 times greater than the rate in another health district, I think we have a problem of great interest and of great importance. The infant mortality rate actually increased in seven Boston Health Districts between 1950 and 1961. The problem of higher rates of infant death, and premature birth with its sequelae, among poverty-ridden groups is similar in all the large cities, and 25 million people live in 15 cities in the United States. Left to right — Derek Robinson, Olivia Brum, Sylvia Krakow, Elizabeth Rice, Ruth Butler, William Schmidt, Miriam Ekdahl, Isabelle Valadian. I hope that studies related to the new maternity and infant care projects will show whether perinatal casualties can be reduced and, if so, to what extent and by what means. Such studies are closely related to other community studies of maternal and child health that we have been interested in. Among them are studies of variation in prenatal and child care in Cambridge, social factors in child health services in a hous¬ ing development, and care of children of parents hospitalized for mental illness. Involve¬ ment with problems of maternal and child health services in this area provides fresh material for seminars, the chief method of teaching in the Department. I have a deep interest in the problems of maternal and child health in other coun¬ tries, but I think that the problem on our doorstep cannot be ignored. William M. Schmidt Head of the Department 24

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I TEND to agree with the remark attributed to Lord Kelvin, When you cannot measure it, when you cannot express it in numbers, your knoiii- edge is of a maegre and unsatisfactory kind.” The most useful numbers are, of course, statistics, since statistics not only express knowledge but, at the same time, measure lack of knowledge or uncer¬ tainty. In a world full of decisions that have to be made in the face of uncertainty, such numbers should be a great comfort. Robert B. Reed Head of the Department Left to right —Jane Menken at the IBM 1620 playing Reed’s composition for typewriter and EDPS for Diana Fischer, Joan Davidson, Lena Wettermark, Claire Wasserboehr, Robert Reed, Linda Parrish, Judith Bryden, Carol Evans, Jane Worcester, and David Heer. 23

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MATERNAL AND William Morris Schmidt Head of Departmefii of Maternal and Child Health CHILD HEALTH