INDURA′TION. In pathology, an increase in the consistence of any portion of the body, usually resulting from chronic inflammation, pressure, or friction.
IN′FANCY. “The domestic treatment of infants and children is comprised in the application of the laws of health to the mother as well as to the child. The position of parent is one of serious responsibility, both morally and physically, and the edict has gone forth that ‘the sins of the parent shall be visited on the children.’ If we could ensure good mothers, we could vastly improve the race of men. The nursing mother of a sick infant must, by following faithfully the rules of health in respect of the four great hygienic principles—food, clothing, exercise, and ablution—give health with her milk to her offspring; she must also pay close attention to her mind, avoid all sources of irritation and anxiety, and remember that an angry mother sours her milk, and produces a fractious and often a diseased infant. I am quite of opinion that if mothers were sound in constitution, and bestowed the requisite care upon the maintenance of their health, we should hear little of diseases of children. In children, as well as in parent, the rules of health must be carried out,” and their neglect cannot fail to bring with it a heavy retribution. (Eras. Wilson.) See Exercise, Nursing, &c.
INFANT DEATH-RATE. In England, according to Dr Farr, out of 1000 infants born, 149 die annually before reaching their first year; and the same authority tells us that 311 out of every 1000 die during the first month in the same period. Amongst illegitimate children, the lives of one half never exceed the first month.
The above figures represent the yearly average of infantile deaths throughout the whole of England, when we come to the large cities the mortality is notably higher. In Liverpool, for instance, out of 1000 children born, 239 died in their first year.
When we examine into the infant mortality prevailing amongst different classes, we find the proportion existing between the death-rate of the children of the nobility, and the general death-rate up to one year, to be as 3 to 8.
In 1874, Mr Charles Ansell, jun., published a work entitled ‘Statistics of Families of the Upper and Professional Classes,’ in which he showed, from investigations into the deaths occurring amongst 48,000 children of the wealthy, professional, and titled classes, that in the first year of life, about 80 only of such children die out of every 1000. According to Dr Farr, the northern countries of Europe show a much lower infant death-rate than the southern ones. Infant mortality is lowest in Norway, and highest in High Bavaria, where 404 infants per 1000 die in their first year. In New York, in 1869, the mortality amongst infants under one year old was 27·4 per cent. and in 1873, 31·0 per cent.
Both in France and England the mortality prevailing amongst illegitimate children up to the age of one year is very large. In 1860, the death-rate amongst the foundlings of the
Loire-Inférieure, was as much as 876 in the 1000, and it averages between 500 and 700 in France. In Wakefield, amongst the same class of children, it was 26·22 per cent.; in Coventry, 40; in Padstow, 50; and in Bantry, 80; in manufacturing towns the average is 35 per cent. In London the number of illegitimate children who die annually under the age of a year is probably about 75 per cent.[357]
[357] ‘Proceedings of the Obstetrical Society for 1870.’
In the Montreal Foundling Asylum, out of 4060 infants, only 7 per cent. lived one year. In the rural districts of England and also in Bavaria, the average of deaths at one year is about the same for the illegitimate as for the legitimate children.