Abstract
IN the July issue of the Boletin de la Oficina Sanitaria Panamericana, Dr. Ricardo Odriosola, Minister of Health for Paraguay, states that organized public health work in his country began on August 16, 1889, with the creation of the National Health Council, which was merged in 1917–18 with the National Public Assistance and Welfare Commission (created in 1915) to form a Department of Health and Welfare. This was succeeded on June 15, 1936, by the present Ministry of Health, with its five departments—Public Health of the Capital, Rural Hygiene, Hygiene, Child Welfare and Odontology. Paraguay's most serious problems at present are surveys of the causes of death and the system of school lunches, to which 15 per cent of the municipal income has been assigned, and which are now being supplied in eighty towns. Leprosy comes next in importance. Compulsory vaccination against typhoid fever has been introduced. Malaria has become increasingly severe, and fourteen sanitary commissions have been organized to combat it by distributing quinine, oiling breeding–places of mosquitoes and draining swamps. Hookworm disease is also being combated.
Article PDF
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Health of Paraguay. Nature 148, 466 (1941). https://doi.org/10.1038/148466b0
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/148466b0