Child hygiene / by S. Josephine Baker.

  • Sara Josephine Baker
Date:
[1925]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Child hygiene / by S. Josephine Baker. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    CHAPTER I THE CHILD, THE PARENT, AND THE STATE “Our responsibility for children is based not alone on human aspirations, but it is also based upon the necessity to secure physical, mental and moral health and the economic and social progress of the nation. Every child that is delinquent in body, education, or char¬ acter is a charge upon the whole community, as a whole, and a menace to the community itself. The children are the army with which we march to progress.” —Herbert Hoover Child hygiene is a term referring to all conditions per¬ taining to the health of children from the beginning of the prenatal period to the end of adolescence. The child-hygiene movement as we know it to-day is essentially modern. In its methods, technique, and results it stands by itself as a distinct achievement, yet, vague as the historical background may be, we find that in isolated in¬ stances there was a recognition centuries ago that the welfare of the child was the concern of the state, and that it affected society as a whole. It may be assumed that the parental instinct has always been present, though its manifestation at times seems exceedingly tenuous. It is impossible to place any definite date as marking the first assumption by the state of a manifestation of direct authority over the welfare of children. One of the first and most interesting accounts comes to us in the record of the reign of Lycurgus of Sparta. The exact dates of his reign are unknown, but it is generally placed as having occurred
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