“Appalling health conditions” among 900,000 in North Africa have necessitated the immediate introduction of expanded medical program in their behalf, it was reported today by Dr. Jacob J. Golub, chairman of his health committee of the Joint Distribution Committee.
In a report to the J.D.C. executive committee, Dr. Golub declared that “tens thousands of Jewish men, women and children in the Moslem lands eke out their harsh ## bitter lives under conditions as wretched and backward as any on the face of the ##th.” He disclosed that the infant mortality rate in the mellah (Jewish quarter of ?ablanca) is one of the highest in the world and that 44 percent of some 3,600 Casa##nca school children recently tested for tuberculosis showed positive reactions.
“In Casablanca, a city harboring some 80,000 Jews, only one dispensary is ?ilable to the Jewish population,” Dr. Golub reported, “Here a single doctor sees the children during a three-hour clinic period in the morning and each afternoon 200 boys and girls are treated for favus. In Marrakech one dispensary serves children ## expectant mothers, but trachoma, the most virulent disease in the area, is left treated, although medical science has a positive cure for this infectious disease.”
Dr. Golub said that J.D.C, already supports several health centers in North Africa but urged that expanded medical care be undertaken at once “to save a whole serration. A minimum of $2,000,000 must be spent by the J.D.C. in North Africa and lea lands this year In order to provide the, medical care and other assistance now desperately needed,” he asserted.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
