(d) To furnish a ready organization for securing or revising neces- sary international agreements for administrative action in matters of health and more particularly for examining those subjects which it is proposed to bring before the Standing and General Committees, with a view to international conventions.
(e) In regard to measures for the protection of the worker against sickness, disease, and injury arising out of his employment, which falls within the province of the International Labour Organization, the International Health Organization will cooperate with and assist the International Labour Organization, it being understood that the International Labour Organization will on its side act in consultation with the International Health Organization in regard to all health matters.
(f) To confer and cooperate with international Red Cross societies and other similar societies.
(g) To advise, when requested, other voluntary organizations in health matters of international concern.
(h) To organize missions in connexion with matters of health at the request of the League of Nations with the concurrence of the countries affected.
Underlying the various functions, as detailed, is the important principle that this newly created international health organiza- tion will " deal with such matters as affect individual countries only in their relation to other countries." This las't phrase clearly indicates and defines the international aspect as opposed to any interference with the internal health organization of any individ- ual nation. These functions were in their main outline drafted in London in April 1920, at an international health conference convened by the British Minister of Health, and subsequently submitted to the Council of the League of Nations for approval; such approval was granted by the Council at the meeting held at San Sebastian.
The machinery so far outlined for the new health organization consists of the following three departments: a general committee, a standing or executive committee, and an international health office or secretariat. The general committee was to consist of: (a) the delegates or their successors appointed to the Office International d'Hygiene Publique by the various signatory Powers to the international agreement drawn up at Rome in 1907; (b) other delegates appointed by countries not included in the Rome agreement, but who had become members of the League of Nations; (c) the medical secretary. This committee was to meet at least once a year at its headquarters in Paris, namely the Office International d'Hygiene Publique; it would appoint its own president and sub-committees and draw up its own constitution. Any member of the committee was empowered to call in the assistance of technical advisers, with no power to vote except when acting as deputy in the absence of the delegate he represents and only after due notice of the change has been sent to the president in writing. The main function of this committee was to receive full reports of the standing or executive committee and of all sub-committees.
The standing or executive committee was to consist of: (a) delegates of the States permanently represented on the Council of the League of Nations; (b) the president and five members of the general committee; (c) a representative of the League of Red Cross Societies; (d) a representative chosen by the govern- ing body of the Labour Conference. This committee was to elect its own chairman and sub-committees, and meet not less than four times a year, and oftener as occasion required; the members were to be elected for a period of three years, and then be eligible for reelection. The committee was empowered to draw up new conventions and revise old ones and render all its reports to the general committee. The International Health Bureau, the headquarters of the League of Nations, was to in- clude the medical secretary, appointed by the standing com- mittee, and directly responsible to it for such duties as it might assign. The medical secretary is entitled to attend all com- mittees 3r sub-committees and to have the right of direct access to the secretary-general of the League and to communicate with the various national health organizations. The personnel of the bureau was to consist as far as possible of persons of dif- ferent nationalities, all appointed by the standing committee on the nomination of the medical secretary. The medical secre- tary was to prepare in advance an annual budget for the approval of the standing committee and be responsible to the secretary-general of the League for all expenditure he might incur. The League of Nations was to provide all approved expenditure.
It will readily be agreed that the organization above outlined indicates great possibilities for the advancement of international public health; such machinery as is proposed should be capable of effecting a much-needed coordination among the individual nations, especially in such matters as shipping hygiene, port sanitation, etc., but how far the new organization will prove an advance on the work carried out by the various international health congresses held periodically at different centres will depend in some measure on the capabilities of the personnel to be ap- pointed for the control of the new machine. It is greatly desired that the health organization of the League of Nations shall prove to be something more than an international bureau for the collecting and transmitting of health statistics.
Important as is the consideration of the various points of contact among individual nations in matters pertaining to general sanitation, yet there lies before the League of Nations the larger function of influencing the health of the people in the various countries in matters pertaining to the prevention of disease. Popular educational propaganda for the dissemination of knowledge in hygiene is likely to be more effective in raising the general standard of health of a people than the more tedious method of " patchy " and intermittent legislation. The " will to health " has to be quickened in the individual citizen by means of education, and one of the most hopeful elements in the new organization is the proposal to work in cooperation with voluntary organizations, which are more likely to be effective in carrying out educational health propaganda than when such is attempted by an official state organization.
One other aspect of the new organization that is suggestive of great possibilities is the fact that International Labour is to be represented on the standing or executive committee. The whole question of industrial hygiene as it affects the health and welfare of the worker is thus likely to receive that degree of attention which is so much needed. (N. B.)
MEDINA (see 18.64). Before the World War, Medina was less known to Europeans than Mecca, although it was described by the earlier travellers, Burckhardt and Burton, and by Wavell (who visited it in 1908) as late as 1912. Much new information regarding existing conditions in the city was obtained as a result of the war operations.
A Turkish staff map of the environs of Medina, on the 1 :5o,ooo scale, captured after the surrender, the first map available since Burton's sketch made about 70 years ago, shows the plan and dis- position of the city, and photographs seized from the Turks revealed for the first time the nature and character of some of its buildings. The dimensions of the city were overestimated by earlier writers, the walls actually measuring' not more than ij m. in circumference, with the longest diameter a little over i m. E. and W. The Hejaz railway has its terminal station outside the city walls at the Bab el 'Ambari, the gate on the S.W. through which runs the road to Yambo'. During the war a branch was carried from the main line, through a breach in the walls on the N.W. side, to the outskirts of the Haram, or Great Mosque, which was used as a munition store and intended to serve as an inner citadel in case of siege.
At the outbreak of the revolt in June 1916 the Arabs, unable to take the city by assault, withdrew and began a blockade which as they were unwilling to bombard the city for fear of damage to the holy places and refused to cut the water-supply conduit lasted until the Turks surrendered the city in Jan. 1919. In 1917 Fakhri Pasha, commander of the garrison, devised a scheme for the rebuild- ing and modernization of Medina, but all that happened was the destruction of a great number of houses for the sake of the beams and woodwork to feed the railway locomotives. Extensive palm planta- tions outside the walls, E. and N.E., were also ravaged for the same purpose. Large palm-gardens which formerly occupied much space within the walls were, in great part, built over, and the Barr el Manakha, or central open space, was encroached upon.
Before the World War the normal resident population was estimated at 40,000, of whom a large proportion were aliens who had settled after pilgrimage. The Turks deported about three-quarters of the inhabitants during the blockade, and, allowing for further decrease by disease, the population in 1920 was well under 10,000.
For plan, see ARABIA.
MEHTA, SIR PHEROZESHAH MERWANJI (1845-1915), In- dian Moderate leader and municipal reformer, was the son of a Bombay merchant. Educated at the Elphinstone College, he
