Conception Control and Its Effects on the Individual and the Nation | Page 5

to an extension of venereal disease. Many people
seem to think that contraceptives prevent venereal disease at the same
time that they prevent conception. But this is not so. The use of
methods of prevention by women is no protection to them from
infection.
3. We have, moreover, to take a wider view, and consider who will
receive and act upon the advice given, and hence what the result will be
on the differential birth-rate of the community.
It is quite obvious that the educated classes can most easily follow
instructions which result in protection from conception, and since such
knowledge most easily circulates among the more highly endowed
classes, it has been claimed that it is important to make efforts to let the
knowledge be so widespread that it may reach all. The result, however,

could only be that the practice of conception control would spread
throughout the upper, middle and more intelligent of the working
classes, and this would involve a very serious reduction in the births of
those who furnish the leaders and efficient workers in all branches of
life, and in those only.
For the birth-rate amongst the least intelligent, least efficient and the
mentally deficient will be unaffected. It must be apparent that after a
very few generations of such weeding out of the best, with the
continuous multiplication of the worst type of citizen, the general
standard of efficiency, enterprise and executive skill of the nation
would be seriously impaired. Such, briefly stated, is the problem before
the public at the present time.

CHAPTER II
THE DEMAND FOR KNOWLEDGE AND FROM WHOM TO
OBTAIN IT
Even the brief survey given in the first chapter will have suggested to
the reader that the people who ask for knowledge seek it for various
reasons. Indeed, the first thing that strikes anyone who gives
consideration to the subject is the difference in type and circumstance
of the people for whom relief is claimed. We begin to realise at once
that the subject of conception control is an intimate and individual one,
and can only really be dealt with by advice which is given to the
individual and not to the public at large.
This is perhaps most obvious in the first group mentioned on page 17,
where the woman is suffering from chronic or acute disease, and the
necessity for preventing conception is clear to her medical adviser. If
disease renders child-bearing a danger to the life and health of the
mother, it becomes a positive duty of her doctor to prevent such a
catastrophe--but the method advised will differ according to the special
nature of the case.

Again, where in the case of husband or wife there is a serious
inheritance of mental or physical disease, and especially when the same
weakness exists in both families, it is justly regarded as a duty by the
married pair not to bring children into the world. It may be contended
that men and women with such an inheritance should not marry, but
that is a matter for the decision of the individuals concerned. It not
infrequently happens that marriage has taken place before they know of
the inherited tendency. In such cases clearly the advice of the family
doctor should be given as to the best course to pursue in order to avoid
conception.
The case of the overworked and burdened mother with a large and
increasing family is nearly allied to that of a woman with disease,
though in her case the causes for ill-health are more complicated.
While it is true that ill-health and premature ageing in working women
are the result of many causes, yet where child-bearing still further
injures health it is essential that she should consult her medical adviser
on this point, for she not only needs treatment to restore her health, but
also advice specially suitable to her own case, as to the best method to
avoid conception for the time being, and such advice will vary
according as the disability is temporary or permanent.
It is, happily, as possible for the poor woman to obtain advice in all
matters of health as it is for the rich. The mothers of the country are in
touch everywhere with maternity clinics, where doctors advise them on
all questions of health relating to pregnancy, and treat each woman as a
separate individual.
But the case of the poor working woman overburdened with work
which she cannot accomplish--yet with the added burden of bearing
more children than her more fortunate sisters, deserves some further
consideration.
What is it that prematurely ages so many of these women of the
slums--is it child-bearing alone?
The answer to that is immediately in the negative, for women in

comfortable circumstances may have large families, with no sign of
weariness and dejection.