IN THE WORLD OF SCIENCE

—

New chemicals

are

ECAUSE of the swiftly increasing use of new chemi-

cals and metals in modern industrial plants, great
numbers of workers are menaced by dread diseases
hitherto almost unknown. A reader has asked about this
situation, The problem is very complex, but here are a

few highlights.

‘Take the fluid called benzene
or benzol, distilled from coal tar.
Once thought to be almost harm-
tess, benzene is now known to
cause’ leukemia, a terrible, fatal
disease of the blood.

Without a doubt many work-

ers have died of this disease,

without their doctors realizing
that benzene might have been
the cause. We know this is so
becausei only this year has the
Ameri Medical Association of-
ficially drawn attention to the
danger in is journal Occupation-
al Medicine. F
British \ doctors studied this
problem dpring the war. Not all
people are fatally sensitive to
benzene, but those who are may
die within \three weeks of inhal-

ing the vapors. Only a very few -

victims redover. Severe illness
also results in many more who
do not develop lukemia.

Dr. Donald Hunter, head of
the Department of Research in
industrial Medicine, . London,
says: “Poisoning could be pre-
vented by abandoning ot use

(benzene) as a solvent, and from
medical investigators all over
the world comes the plea to ‘use
one of the many harmless sub-
stitutes.”

Committees should immediately
check their plants to make sure
no benzene is used, alone or as
‘part of a solvent mixture. Be
cause of the extreme danger to
anyone imhaling benzene it
should not be hard to get the
cooperation of management.

e
NOTHER grave disease is en
pneumonoconiosis, affecting

the lungs. It is caused by inhal-
ing a great variety of industrial
dusts. Workmen’s Compensation
does not often recognize the in-
dustrial cause of this disease,
and unions should have compe-
tent doctors give them the facts.
Then they can press for proper
compensation.

More important, workers can
demand the elimination of dusts.
Economical and effective means
are now available for control-
ling all industrial dusts, and

deadly

By DYSON CARTER

there ‘is no reason why manage-
* ment should tolerate such haz-

- ards.

LMOST unknown to plant

bosses and ~Avorkers sis the
extremely poisonous nature of
many metals now coming into
use. Platinum, for example,
produces severe asthma in many
people, Photographic workers
are frequently exposed to plati-
num chemicals and light cases
of poisoning (the cause of which
was unknown) were locted in
Chicago photo film plants this
year. Ge

All sorts of baffling nose,
throat, lung and skin diseases
have been found to result from

PUTTEATUUCUTTNETTUETENTETESTONEREOETELSTSHiNHDAAAH TAIT

A guide to good

NANDO ABAYA’S BOOK
in the Philippines
- with a foreword by Harold
Ickes, Roosevelt's secretary of
the interior, is a glimpse behind
an ‘iron curtain’ of which we
have heard nothing, much as we
may have suspected its pres-
ence. Long announced, the book
has just appeared. The publish-
ers state that the printing was-
delayed until the author, a na-
tive Filipino, could get out of
the country, in itself a commen-
tary on conditions in the Phili-
pines today.

Betrayal in the Philippines is
an expose of President Roxas
and the other collaborators who
formed the Japanese puppet gov-
ernment and declared war on
the United States, but who were

later whitewashed by powerful -

American interests headed by
‘General Douglas MacArthur.

Perhaps most important is the
chapter which tells of the rise
of the Communist-led Hukbala-
hap peasant guerilla army in the
fight against Japan. Destruction
of this army was the job handed
‘the collaborators by the Japanese
—the same job they have taken
over for the American imperial-
ists, as witness the outbreaks of
severe fighting in recent months.

While the book is not written
in a style that carries the reader
Sweeping along to clearly drawn
conclusions, it is crammed with
facts and quotations which makes
it essential reading to those int-
erested in the revolutionary up-
heavals taking place across the
Pacific.

e

NGUISHED howls from cer-
tain vulnerable quarters have
set the censorship in motion
again and Heavenly Discourse, a
sparkling satire on hypocrisy
banned in book form 20 years

FRIDAY, MARCH 14, 1947

“Childe,

ago in Canada, has now been
denied entry into the country of
the Penguin reprint. Not, how-
ever, before a: few thousand
cbpies slipped in to be snatched
up by lucky readers. Existing
copies will no doubt be highly
treasured now that the supply
has stopped.

However, this is only incident-
ally a protest against censor-
ship; it serves as a_ starting
point for a quick glance at the
pocket-book field. To _ relieve
the solid array of mass-produc-
tion whodunits, a few bright
spots have appeared recently,
most of them carrying the Pen-
guin imprint — American Pen-
guins. The British series is not
available here. While consider-
ably inferior in content, the Am-
erican editions have some out-
standing choices the success of
which should soon be reflected
in pocket book selections as a
whole.

Apart from Heavenly Dis-
course two other titles are out-
standing. One is Patterns of
Culture, in which the world fa-
mous anthropologist, Ruth Bene-
dict, studies the contrasting cul-
tures of three primitive peoples
including our own Kwakiutl In-
dians. The books adds greatly
to our knowledge of the life of
the Kwakiutls, which is of elose
interest to us, and for many
people Patterns of Culture will
provide a new understanding of
how the individual is shaped and
‘moulded by the social group to
which he belongs.

NOTHER Penguin, What Hap- -
ened in History, by Gordon
in an essentially sound
outline of history which is far
ahead of Wells’ work by virtue
of clearer approach. It is a

_biography of Van Gogn,

reading

valuable work brought within
the reach of thousands in the
25c edition.

Martin Eden by Jack London;
The Unvanquished by Howara
Fast ‘and Good Soldier Shweih
by Jaroslav Hasek, are some of
the best of the fiction titles list-
éd by Penguin.

Pocket Books (with the Kan-
garoo imprint) has an excellent
new series out which sells at
35c.

Current titles in this line are:

Wells’ Outline of History; Baby
and Child Care by Benjamin
Spock, M.D. which is really
good; Roget’s Thesaurus; Devils,
Drugs and Doctors by Howard
Haggard, M.D., the fascinating
story of the science of healing
from medicine man to modern
doctor, and two topnotch fiction
titles—Lust for Life (actually a
the
painter), by Irving Stone and
Nara by Emile Zola. -
“In the Bantam series Grapes
of Wrath by Steinbeck and What
Makes Sammy Run are note-
worthy.

Generally speaking, with the’
appearance of Penguins and. the
improvement in other lines
there is ground for hope that
the pocket book publishers are
raising their ‘literary sights a
bit and what with diminishing
puchasing power this will be a

welcome development to every- —

one—HAL MILLER.

BECOMMENDED BOOKS
World Monopoly and Peace,

James S. Allen ......... $3.25
Lesson 0 Germany, ;

Gerhard Eisler ......... 3.25
Fight For Peace,

Henry Wallace ..... es RD,
Out Of Your Pocket, }

Darel McConkey ....... 1.00

working with metals like man-
8anese, vanadium, beryllium, as-
mium and cadmium. Disease can
result from the pure metals, the
alloys, dusts and chemical com-
pounds.

Symptoms are similar to the
whole array of ‘allergy’ diseases
and rarely is the true cause
established. Most victims are
ATIC Tern es

vanced of the entire world and
that the Communist Party is the
most powerful party in France,
supported at the polls by millions
and attracting to its ranks such
giants in the field of the arts
and sciences as Picasso, Lange-
vin, the Joliot-Curies.

There is a lesson for Cana-
Gians in the manner in which
the French Communists cherish
and build on the best traditions
of the French people and emerge
as the true patriots of thir-coun-
try. In the words of that great

mmm ADIT

= solid.

AULT

. pensation.

LE

The Paris Commune

-world. Our love for our countty

both material and __ spiri
greatness.”
ULNA

A CHALLENGE!

The decision of the Southam Company
to lock out and dismiss its long-term
ITU Printers and import strikebreakers
is a challenge to the security of every
working man in British Columbia.

Your Job Next!

@ Yes, it may be your Job next. The ITU printers are standings

What Are You Doing To Help?

Not one printer who was locked out by the Bouthan: Daily Pree
z ince nine months ago hag returned to work.

THE SOUTHAM

‘he Daily Province

IS THE ONLY NEWSPAPER IN B.C. PRODUCED wire

Strikebreakers

fired for chronic sickness, %
are forced to pay for treatmé
which should be met by coat

FYZERYONE knows that arseald
is a deadly poison. It is
in many industries under
ety’ conditions which pro
the workers from gross poiso®
ing. It has lately been disco
ered, however, that very 5
quantities of arsenic dust, n0
sufficient to cause familiar pol
80n symptoms, will bring
cancer of the lungs. This for™
of carcinoma is probably the
worst and most often fatal.
These new facts (there 2
many more) emphasize the u!é
ent need for unions to get medi
cal help in studying the neW¥
and extremely serious occuP® |
tional hazards, so that safe |
measures and proper compens¥ —
ion can be fought for. All case? —
of fellow-workers being dls E
charged because of chronic i |
ness should be very thorough
investigated in order to discovel
possible causes on the job.

4 oe

son of the people, Mauric?
Thorez: “Our love for our cout
try is a love for its noblest tt@
ditions and for its finest aspit®
tions, it is a determination
see it achieve its splendid de*
tiny of torchbearer to the whol

is a love for its people. . . W®
are the truest servants of th?
French Commonwealth in thé
sense that we bring them to thé
means by which they can achiev® —