View report page

62 administrative work.
Children under 5 years of age were also excluded from all Schools from April 25th to
May 18th.
In August last the Education Committee of the County Council issued new regulations
relating to infectious disease in schools. The most important change made therein, was the
extension of the quarantine periods for scarlet fever and diphtheria—the time being now a
fortnight in each case from the date of last contact, if the patient be removed to hospital,
and a week from day of disinfection, if the patient be kept at home. Fresh instructions were
issued to the Staff of the Department, to bring the work into harmony with the new rules.
From the beginning of this year notices have been left with each family residing in an infected
house stating the earliest dav on which any children attending school may resume attendance,
such notices being additional to the exclusion notices sent to the schools.
Complaints having been received from time to time of children being forced to attend
school when absence was directed by the medical attendant—usually the physicians of outpatients'
departments of hospitals—an arrangement was concluded with the Education Officer
of the County whereby hospital attendance cards or papers bearing the doctor's initials and a
recent date will be accepted as certificates exempting children from attendance at school.
A considerable number of children excluded from school on account of sore throat, ringworm,
&c., have been seen and examined by the Medical Officer of Health, before
re-admission to school. Such practice appears to be desirable, as otherwise a number of
excluded children would be sent to school without any evidence of freedom from infection.
Advice is not given, the parents being instructed to consult a private practitioner when advice
or treatment is found necessarv.
School notices (Form 84) are, as a rule, sent in more promptly than in the past but
occasionally there is still delay and considerable correspondence is required to secure the
information which the Code directs shall be sent in as soon as a child has been excluded from
school. Some teachers wait until they have made certain of the cause of a child's
absence instead of informing the Department of an unexplained absence at once. Such
course involves delay which may be disastrous. To effectively check infectious disease and
prevent its spread in a school prompt notice to the Department is essential, to allow investigations
to be made at the earliest possible date. There is still one defect in the system of
dealing with infectious diseases in school, in that any information of infectious disease which
the Attendance Officers may collect in the course of their visits, is not communicated to the
Department direct, but has to come through the School Teachers. Such procedure involves
an unnecessary delay which may amount to a week.
Intkrnotification.—Information relating to non-resident children attending school and to
the members of their families, is exchanged between the Medical Officers of Health of this
and the circumjacent Districts. Last year information relating to 180 cases in connection
with local schools, was received, the particulars of which are given below.
Disease. Kensington. Willesden. Hampstead. Marylebone.
Scarlet fever 6 6 1 2
Diphtheria 7 3 — 2
Enteric fever — 1 — 1
Measles 11 77- 5
Whooping Cough 5 28 — 1
Chickenpox 2 22 — —
Cerebro-Spinal Fever — — — —
31 (31) 137 (77) 1 (11) 11 (4)