Jewish Health Deteriorating Because of Economic Hardships in Eastern Europe and Jewish Health Work M

The Jewish Health World Federation Oze, of which Professor Albert Einstein is President, is in a critical position on account of the economic crisis, one of the leaders of the Oze headquarters said to the J.T.A. to-day.

There is not a day, he stated, without the Oze head office in Berlin receiving appeals from its branches in Eastern Europs, for urgent aid to save them from having to close down. The acute economic crisis, he said, has hit our Organisation and its work in Eastern Europe for the improvement of the health conditions of the Jewish population, much more than most other organisations, and hundreds of our institutions for children and adults are finding it impossible to continue their work.

A letter from Latvia, he went on, says: In Riga, the capital, the shops are empty. People do not know where they are to get their next crust of bread. Bills are no longer discounted. All life is paralysed. In the provinces things are even worse. All our departments, which have been fighting tuberculosis, doing infant welfare work and looking after the health conditions of the school children are now unable to do their work. The subventions which they have been receiving hitherto from the Government and from the Municipalities have been stopped, and private contributions are no longer obtainable. Impoverishment is increasing rapidly. Without help from abroad we have no hope of continuing.

In Poland, a Conference has been held of the Toz, the Polish Organisation of the Oze, at which it was established that the growth of impoverishment is bringing about a tremendous increase in the attendances at our medical institutions, particularly the tuberculosis institutions and the children’s institutions. According to the reports of the delegates, the examination of patients in the Toz institutions show a serious decline in the general health conditions of the Jewish population of Poland, and especially of the children. The economic distress is at the same time so acute, that it is impossible to charge the patients even the smallest fee for the medical attention they receive. The Conference has decided to appeal to Jewish world opinion to make a big effort to prevent the collapse of these vital institutions of Polish Jewry.

Similar reports, just as alarming in character, it was added, are being received from other countries, especially from Bessarabia.