The National Red Cross Societies

Successive Colonial wars also involved a number of national societies in the obligation of providing special personnel and equip ment adapted for work in tropical climates. The World War naturally led to the organization of Red Cross activity on a tre mendous scale. The American Red Cross, for example, mobilized 23,000 nurses, 55,000 nurses' aids and 6,000,000 voluntary helpers, and set up canteens, hospitals, etc., wherever American troops were engaged or in training. The British Red Cross, working in close collaboration with the Order of St. John of Jerusalem and the dominion societies, provided trained nurses, voluntary aid detachments, ambulances and hospitals behind the French front, in England and in Malta, as well as in Egypt, Palestine, Corfu and Mesopotamia. Motor ambulance convoys were organized by the British Red Cross for the evacuation of the wounded, in addition to ambulance trains and (in Mesopotamia) motor ambulance launches. Material and personnel were also provided by the society for hospital ships in the Channel, in the Mediterranean and elsewhere. Similar energy was shown by the Red Cross so cieties of the other belligerent countries, notably the French, German, Belgian, Italian, Austro-Hungarian, Russian, Serbian and Turkish societies. The Red Cross societies of neutral countries (Switzerland, Holland, Sweden, Denmark, Norway and Spain) were also active in providing assistance to prisoners of war, hos pital facilities for serious cases of wounds and sickness, and food supplies for the populations of occupied territories. Some of the latter were also evacuated into neutral territory.

Post-war Work.

The extent of the work done by the national societies during the war naturally raised their prestige and gave them a recognized place in the affections of the public. The widening of the scope of Red Cross action was a natural result of this and the societies, following the cessation of hostilities, assumed fresh responsibilities which they have shown themselves able to discharge, thanks to their large membership, to the re sources at their command, and to the reserves of material at their disposal. The present activities of Red Cross societies may be summarized as follows : (a) Activities aimed at relieving sufferings consequent on the war : Training of disabled men (establishment of orthopaedic clinics and mechano-therapic institutes, provision of artificial limbs, convalescent homes and special workshops for the disabled).

Assistance to ex-service men, war widows and orphans.

Homes for the permanently disabled. (The Star and Garter Home, Richmond, founded and endowed with the assistance of the British Red Cross is an outstanding example.) Assistance to the population of devastated regions. (The French. Red Cross has established in the old battle area and in the liber ated territories, dispensaries, child welfare centres, milk stations, and relief has been supplied to more than 3,00o French villages by the American Red Cross.)

During the famines and epidemics in central Europe in the five years immediately following the armistice, Red Cross so cieties supplied the countries affected with food and medical stores and sent in doctors and ambulance personnel. In a num ber of countries (particularly Belgium, Italy, Japan, the Nether lands and the United States) emergency relief work has been brought to a high state of perfection. The Red Cross societies of these countries have a very complete system for setting in motion at short notice relief detachments fully equipped with food, transport, tents and medical stores, for purposes of relief in case of earthquakes, fires, floods, etc.

(b) Main present activities: Permanent Hospitals. National Red Cross societies in cer tain countries maintain general hospitals (such as the Japanese Red Cross hospital at Tokyo, the Netherlands Red Cross hospital at The Hague and the German Red Cross hospital at Cassel). They also maintain specialized institutions : Clinics for surgical cases, for children, for skin diseases, for affections of the ear, nose and throat, and for maternity cases. Nursing homes, homes for mental cases and hospitals for infectious diseases are also maintained by the Red Cross. Tuberculosis cases are treated in sanatoria, which have been built on suitable sites and provided with facilities for air and sun treatment. Instances of this work are to be found in the British empire, in France, Germany, Italy, the United States and the U.S.S.R. The Belgian Red Cross among others has set up a radium institute and provides facili ties for radium treatment of cancer.

In countries liable to malaria and to tropical and epidemic diseases, special hospitals have been set up by the Red Cross. Thus the Italian Red Cross maintains malaria hospitals, the Georgian Red Cross at Tiflis an Institute of Tropical Medicine, the Ukrainian Red Cross typhus hospitals, the Chinese Red Cross at Shanghai a hospital for summer diseases. Leper asylums are also maintained by certain societies. In a number of cases, na tional Red Cross societies have assisted in the establishment of quarantine stations for travellers or emigrants.

Other societies again possess scientific research institutes and laboratories for the manufacture of serum in connection with hospitals. The Siamese Red Cross maintains a regular service for the administration of anti-snake bite serum.

Hospital social service has been organized by the Red Cross in Great Britain, France and the United States, including the organization of hospital libraries and the arrangement of lectures, concerts, theatricals and cinematograph displays for patients.