Fifteen Million Pupils Ill

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Sep 12, 1912

Fifteen Million Pupils Ill.

Fifteen million American schoolchildren need a doctor's attention. This is the estimate furnished the United States Bureau of Education by Dr. Thomas D. Wood, professor of physical education in the Columbia University Teachers' College.

"Of the 20,000,000 schoolchildren in this country," says Dr. Wood, "not less than seventy-five per cent need attention for physical defects which are prejudicial to health, and which are partially or completely remediable."

Some of the doctor's conclusions are as follows:—

"Several million children have two or more handicapping defects; 400,000 have organic heart-disease; at least 1,000,000 have or have had tuberculosis; about 1,000,000 have spinal curvature, flatfoot, or some other moderate deformity; more than 1,000,000 have defective hearing; about 5,000,000 are suffering from malnutrition; more than 6,000,000 have enlarged tonsils, adenoids, or enlarged cervical glands; more than 10,000,000 have defective teeth which are interfering with health. About one hundred cities have as many different kinds of organizations for the care of health in the schools."—Selected.