Rockefeller Report

President George Edgar Vincent of the Rockefeller Foundation last week published a preliminary statement of what the Foundation accomplished last year.

Many a public health official many an educator searched the report for hints of what aid he might wheedle from the Foundation for his particular work next year. But wheedling the Rockefeller Foundation for money is in vain. Its program is definite, although by no means inflexible. Their trustees, with John D. Rockefeller Jr. at their head, decide on a year's program; their administrators, organized by President Vincent, accomplish that program.

Aim. Last year the Rockefeller Foundation set out to maintain scientific research in public health affairs; to support medical education; to train health officers, laboratory workers, engineers and nurses: to organize health ices; to secure appropriate legislation; to provide money where necessary; and to stir up public opinion to support public health. Accomplishments. During 1926 the Foundation spent $9,741,474, and got these definite results:

1) aided the growth of 14 medical schools in ten different countries;

2) maintained a modern medical school and teaching hospital in Peking;

3) assisted the development of professional public health training in 15 institutions in twelve countries and in ten field stations in the United States and Europe;

4) contributed to nurse training-schools in the United States, Brazil, France, Poland, Jugoslavia, China, Japan and Siam;

5) sent, as emergency aid, journals, books or laboratory supplies to institutions in 20 European countries;

6) helped 21 governments to combat hookworm disease;

7) gave funds to organized rural health services in 244 counties in the United States and to 34 districts in twelve other countries;

8) shared in the creation or support of various departments in state or national health services in 16 countries;

9) cooperated with Brazil in the control of yellow fever, or in precautionary measures against the yellow fever mosquito, in ten states;

10) continued yellow fever surveys and studies in Nigeria and on the Gold Coast;

11) aided efforts to show the possibilities of controlling malaria in nine North American states and in Porto Rico, Nicaragua, Salvador, Argentina, Brazil, Italy, Spain, Poland, Palestine and the Philippine Islands;

12) helped to improve the teaching of physics, chemistry and biology in eleven institutions in China and in the government university of Siam;

13) supported the Institute of Biological Research of Johns Hopkins University and contributed toward the publication of Biological Abstracts;

14) gave funds for biological or mental research at Yale University, the State University of Iowa, and the Marine Biological Station at Pacific Grove, Calif.;

15) provided, directly or indirectly, fellowships for 889 men and women from 48 different countries, and paid the traveling expenses of 69 officials or professors making study visits either individually or in commissions;

16) helped the Health Committee of the League of Nations to conduct international study tours or interchanges for 120 health officers from 48 countries;

17) continued to aid the League's information service on communicable diseases;

18) made surveys of health conditions, medical education, nursing, biology, or anthropology in 31 countries;

19) lent staff members as consultants and made minor gifts to many governments and institutions ;

20) assisted mental hygiene projects both in the United States and in Canada, demonstrations in dispensary development in New York City, and other undertakings in public health, medical education, and allied fields.

Effects. The Rockefellers, father and son, when President Vincent told them of the effects of the Foundation's work, were content. They have given almost $200,000,000 to the Foundation and have sedulously avoided interfering with its operation. Trustees have full control of funds and policies. Yet it is satisfying for a donor. to see his philanthropies prove true benefactions. Said President Vincent:

"Smallpox is almost unknown in parts of Europe and in a few states of the United States; typhoid epidemics are rare in efficiently administered communities; tuberculosis is decreasing among many populations; diphtheria, is coming under successful control; the outlook for preventing the spread of scarlet fever is brighter; malaria is being ousted from various strongholds; yellow fever seems to be making a last stand: cholera cannot seriously invade a country which has a modern water-supply and proper disposal of wastes; typhus has few terrors for communities addicted to soap and water and clean linen."

Exhortation. Although doctors generally accept Rockefeller Foundation advice with eagerness, President Vincent found it necessary last week to exhort them to work for public health in their communities. Said he: "The physicians of a country can make or break a public health program. It is they who diagnose maladies, report cases of communicable disease, educate their patients, make health examinations, give advice about personal hygiene, influence public opinion. It makes a world of difference whether practitioners are wholly devoted to individual ills and curative medicine or are committed to the modern idea of prevention. The progress of public health is largely due to the leadership of doctors of imagination and public spirit."

President Vincent, George Edgar Vincent, 63, possesses the suavity that makes a successful Chautauqua worker, the decisiveness that makes an administrator, the clarity of thought that makes a Rockefeller associate. His first work, after graduating from Yale in 1885, was editorial, with the Chautauqua Press. He has been Vice Principal of the Chautauqua System since 1888; was President of the Chautauqua Institution from 1907 to 1915; has been Honorary President since. The Rockefellers became well acquainted with him while he was teaching at the University of Chicago, institution to which they have given more than $45,000,000. There Teacher Vincent (professor by virtue of scholarship in sociology) became Dean Vincent (of the Junior Colleges, 1900-07; of the Faculties of Arts, Literature & Science, 1907-11). The University of Minnesota took him from the University of Chicago to be President (1911-17); in the War years the Rockefellers wanted him for their Foundation. The Rockefellers have invested dollars in the Foundation; President Vincent uses those dollars in public benefactions.