Worth Twenty-Two Dollars by Editor

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Mar 9, 1916

Worth Twenty-Two Dollars

By Editor

IN explanation of how Life and Health may be worth over $22 to each of its readers every year, we quote the following from the Journal of the American Medical Association:—

“Under the direction of an officer of the United States Public Health Service, the Commission on Industrial Relations conducted a series of investigations which revealed the fact that while much attention has been given of late to accident prevention, yet accidents cause only one seventh as much destitution as does sickness. According to the findings of this commission, each of the thirty-odd million wage earners in the United States loses an average of nine days a year through sickness, at an average cost of $2 a day. The wage loss from this source is over $500,000,000, while the added cost of medical care of at least $180,000,000 increases the total sick bill of the wage earners of the United States to $680,000,000 a year.

“From thirty to forty per cent of cases requiring charitable relief are due to sickness, while sickness among wage earners is primarily the result of poverty, causing insufficient diet, bad housing, inadequate clothing, and unfavorable surroundings in the home.

“According to the commission, the surroundings and place of work and the personal habits of the worker are important but secondary factors. This means that while there should be no diminution in our efforts to secure better conditions in the factory, the office, and the workshop, the real solution of the health problem lies in the improvement of the home.”

From this report does it not appear to be worth while for every family to have the monthly visits of a magazine containing hints and warnings regarding the hygiene of the home and the care of the health of all members of the family? Yet how much more easy and slothful, how much more unreasonable, to go on in the old way, and when the crisis comes, call the doctor, and perhaps afterward the undertaker.

Are our readers among those who are exercising forethought enough to have the regular visits of a health mentor? Do they not think a health mentor may be worth far more than a dollar a year?