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113
The responsibility for this anomalous state of affairs rests, however,
in some measure with the Local Government Board. In
promoting their Bill of 190.'$, the Council endeavoured to get powers
to prevent the erection of houses with rooms having less than a given
specified floor area, but in this they were successfully opposed by
the Local Government Board. As the granting of the certificates
under the Customs and Inland Revenue Acts is entirely within the
discretion of the Medical Officer of Health he is bound to act according
to his judgment, and it would he a travesty of all hygienic
knowledge to certify that rooms with 40 square feet floor area constituted
suitable accommodation for the unfortunate people who have
to spend a third of their life in so confined a space.
There is perhaps no fact in relation to the conditioning of
phthisis on which medical men are more agreed than that living under
such conditions is conducive to the development of tubercular affections.
ICE CREAM VENDORS.
During the summer months the premises where ice cream is
manufactured were periodically inspected, the utensils examined,
and the method of making and storing enquired into. A copy of the
provisions of the Willesden Urban District Council Act 1903, relating
to the manufacture and sale of ice cream was also served on all vendors,
printed in both English and Italian. No serious insanitary conditions
were discovered, the premises being found clean and the method of
preparing and storing in all instances satisfactory. A few minor
defects called for the service of notices. The fact that the custard
has to be boiled before it is frozen, to my mind minimizes the risk
of any infection or contagion.