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keys of the hospitals of the Asylums Board, which had then
recently come into use. In 1881 your Vestry convened the
conference of sanitary authorities which declared in favour of
notification; free hospital treatment of infectious disease;
compulsory removal, when necessary; depauperisation of
medical relief in the hospitals, and maintenance of the hospitals
out of the metropolitan common poor fund (all of which
objects have been secured); the conference having adopted,
without dissent, every one of the resolutions which I prepared,
and your Vestry had approved. Already, since 1876, a
number of provincial sanitary authorities had obtained notification
powers, these bodies being endowed with the privilege
of promoting Bills in Parliament, denied to the sanitary
authorities of London. Parliament had shown no reluctance
to confer such powers ; and had the Local Government Board
been willing to bring in the measure which the deputation
from the vestriesanddistrict boards, and other important bodies,
urged them to introduce, no doubt notification, by an adoptive
measure at least, would have been conceded to London
sanitary authorities in 1881. As it was, the work of the
conference, and the representations of the leaders of the
deputation, seemed to have been without effect; but happily a
result of great importance immediately followed, arising out
of the adoption by the Local Government Board of my advice
to remove small-pox cases out of London for isolation and
treatment. So that, after all, good did come of the conference
which had entailed great and long-continued labour.
But for notification we had to wait yet eight years; for the
further effort to obtain it made by your Vestry in 1887, backed
though it was by the sanitary authorities and other important
bodies, appeared to have ended in failure. It was then that
your Vestry resolved to introduce a system of voluntary
notification, and to pay a fee to medical practitioners for each
case reported. A large increase in knowledge of cases of