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22
MATERNITY AND CHILD WELFARE.
The statistics for the year in regard to births and deaths of infants will be found on
pages 12, 13 and 16 to 18 of this report.
The Borough scheme for Maternity and Child Welfare includes the following activities:—
(а) The dispatch by post of cards of advice to the individual mothers immediately
after the receipt of the notification of birth required by law.
(b) The visiting of expectant and nursing mothers and babies by the
Council's staff of health visitors, who work (a) from the Town Hall and (b)
from the Centres.
(c The provision and maintenance of Maternity and Child Welfare Centres.
Those Centres are partly maintained on a voluntary basis; but the whole of the
professional staff (medical officers and health visitors) are paid and controlled
by the Council, who also pay the rent, rates and taxes of the Centre premises.
(d) The provision of a clinic for ailing mothers and young children, the expenses
being borne partly by municipal and partly by voluntary funds.
(e) The provision of a municipal dental clinic for mothers and young children.
(f) The subsidisation of a Home for sick poor children.
(g) The supply of milk, free or at reduced price, for necessitous mothers (nursing
or expectant) and young children; and the subsidisation of a voluntary fund for
the provision of dinners for nursing and expectant mothers.
(h) The subsidisation of a voluntary fund for the provision of Home Helps.
(i) The subsidisation of four voluntary Day Nurseries.
(j) The subsidisation of voluntary agencies providing, either free or at a reduced
rate, in hospital or at home, midwifery attendance for necessitous St. Pancras
women.
(k) The payment for the homo nursing of sick infants in certain cases.
(l) A Centre for Artificial Light treatment.
(m) The visiting and supervision of necessitous children under 5 years of age
upon discharge from the Borough Poor Law Hospitals.
(n) The provision of convalescent home treatment by subsidy to voluntary
agencies.
Advice Cards.—Besides the posting of cards of advice to the mothers of all infants
whose births have been notified, cards of advice to expectant mothers have been distributed
through University College Hospital, Middlesex Hospital, the Maternity Nursing Association,
and other agencies.
Home Visiting. —The Council's visitors at the Infant Welfare Centres, 19 in number,
are full-time workers, who divide their time between the necessary work at the Centres
and visiting the homes of the mothers and children. In addition there was one full-time
trained worker, not paid by the Council, at the Caversham Road Centre, and one part-time