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6
Measures for checking the spread of Contagious Disease.
The Sanitary and Public Health Committee have always
manifested a desire to deal with the question of means that
ought to be taken for checking the spread of contagious diseases.
A Public Mortuary has been recommended on more than one
occasion; plans and details have been prepared; a disinfecting
establishment has likewise been approved and recommended.
During the last quarter almost every case of Scarlet Fever and
the cases of Small Pox that came under my notice were
visited personally, in order to ascertain whether proper measures
had been taken to isolate the patients, and to cleanse, purify or
disinfect rooms, clothing, bedding and things likely to retain
infection. I generally found this had been effected under the
direction of the medical practitioner in attendance.
In the absence of a disinfecting establishment, a contract has
been entered into with Messrs. Armfield and Son, of Pimlico,
who undertake to remove, cleanse and disinfect articles at a fixed
price per cwt. The suggestions made in my Report presented to
the Vestry in November 1869, on means for carrying out disinfection
in the most effectual manner in this Parish, have already
been carried out in some other Parishes of the Metropolis, and
subsequent experience has shown that the numbers of persons
who have paid for things being purified, would have willingly
sent to such an establishment, and have made it partially, if not
wholly, self-supporting.
Besides a public disinfecting chamber and a washing room
adjoining, the Parish ought to be provided with a hand carriage
for the conveyance of contaminated things requiring to be disinfected,
washed, or purified, away from the houses where Fever
cases have occurred. Public Baths and Wash-houses have long
been wanted in this Parish.
My Report upon certain improvements in the equipment of
the Fever Carriage is now ready for approval and adoption.
While this Report is going through the printer's hands
(January 20), the Sanitary Inspectors are engaged daily in
vigilantly watching, and attending to the isolation and removal
of Small Pox cases that have recently shown themselves in this
Parish. The full details of these will be given in my fortnightly
Reports to the Sanitary and Public Health Committee, and will
be found also in my next quarterly Report.
Some examples of these cases are very instructive, and
demonstrate the urgent necessity of practical enforcement of
Sanitary laws on the part of local authority; indeed, it is only
until some danger threatens the higher classes that the consequences
of the culpable and neglected municipal laws appear in
their true significance.
While, however, much may be done by local authorities to