Hints from the Health Department. Leaflet from the archive of the Society of Medical Officers of Health. Credit: Wellcome Collection, London
The annual report on the health, sanitary condition, &c., &c., of the Parish of St. Mary Abbotts, Kensington for the year 1895
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may be mentioned (1) the depauperisation of medical relief in
the hospitals; (2) the opening of the several institutions to
all classes of the people: (3) the admission of patients on
whatever form of application, subject only to the presentation
of a medical certificate; (4) gratuitous treatment, (5) the
growing popularity of the hospitals themselves; and last,
but not least, (6) the increasing recognition by the public of
the advantages accruing from the isolation of the infectious
sick. The operation of compulsory notification, moreover, has
not been without effect, for now that Sanitary Authorities
become acquainted with, practically, all cases of infectious
disease, they are able to secure the admittance to hospital of
numbers of cases, such as in pre-notification days they would
probably never have so much as heard. In connection with this
important question, it may be mentioned that so far back as
the end of 1893, the Managers had provided normal accommodation
to the extent of about 3,000 beds, for fever and diphtheria
patients, by the erection of additional " temporary "
hospitals at Tottenham and Lower Tooting, and that since
that date sites have been acquired for three more hospitals
for "acute" cases, viz., at Lewisham, at Shooter's Hill,
and at Tooting; the latter site, adjoining the existing
(Fountain) Hospital, described as temporary, although
from the nature of its construction it is calculated to last
for many years. On the Shooter's Hill site a permanent
hospital for about five hundred patients is now
approaching completion. On the Lewisham site a somewhat
larger hospital is in course of erection, and will be finished
next year. Plans, moreover, have been approved for the
permanent hospital at Tooting. On the completion of these
three hospitals, provision will have been made for about 1,550
additional beds for fever, diphtheria, and isolation. The
Managers further desire to find a site for a convalescent
fever hospital south of the Thames, which, it is to be expected,
will not be inferior in capacity to the Northern Hospital, at
Winchmore Hill, for London north of the Thames, which