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Personal hygiene scheme.
For the purpose of assisting at medical inspections, each school nurse is allocated
to a group of schools. Each school in the group is also visited by the school nurse
on a rota, in order that she can carry out the inspection of the personal hygiene of
the children. At each rota visit all the children in the school are so inspected;
each school is visited at least once a term, the schools where conditions are below
normal receiving two or more such rota visits each term. Thus every child is seen
at least three times a year.
In 1933, 1,803,547 examinations of children were made at these rota visits. In
163,173 cases the child was noted as verminous, i.e., in 9.0 per cent. of the examinations,
compared with a percentage of 9.8 on the similar figures for 1932.
From the records made on this basis a consistent improvement has been shown in
the condition of the children's personal hygiene year by year; but, in accordance with
the desire of the Board of Education, arrangements were made, by means of a small
index card, to determine the number of individual children found unclean during the
year, thus eliminating the possibility of counting separately the second or third
record of uncleanliness in respect of any one child. The number of individual
children so recorded was 91,629 (about 15 per cent. of the children on the school
rolls), a figure which represents all those children who were noted infested with live
vermin or their ova. About 54 per cent. of the cases in which verminous conditions
were recorded at the rota visits are stated to be infested with nits only.
The bases of the Council's cleansing scheme are emphasis upon the parents'
primary responsibility, followed by compulsion, where necessary, as provided by
section 87 of the Education Act, 1921. In the earlier stages of the procedure
parents are advised of the trouble, and invited to avail themselves of the facilities