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outbreaks, a retrograde step has been taken by the Education
Board during 1903 in withdrawing Article 101* from the
Educational Code, thereby doing away with the "Epidemic
Grant," hitherto allowed to schools where the average attendance
has been seriously diminished owing to the exclusion, under
medical advice, of infected children, or children from infected
houses.
There can be no doubt but that, in Lambeth Borough (as in all
other districts where it has been efficiently worked), Article
101* has been most advantageous to the Public Health, and its
withdrawal must, therefore, be detrimental in two directions, first
by causing the return to school of children not completely convalescent
from acute infectious disease; and second, by making
it increasingly difficult to exclude from attendance at school,
children who, although in fair health, are capable of spreading
infectious disease, either because they have suffered from slight
attacks, or because they have been recently in contact with cases
of such disease. There will now be danger of teachers (or
officials) increasing the attendances at the risk of the scholars'
health.
Whooping Cough.
Whooping Cough is also a serious disease, especially to young
children. Of the 126 deaths registered in Lambeth Borough
during 1903 from this disease, 121 (i.e., 96.03 per cent.) occurred
in children under 5 years of age, and 65 of the deaths (i.e., 51.6 per
cent.) occurred amongst infants under 1 year of age. It is
therefore, a disease of childhood, and its prevention ought to be
systematically attempted, chiefly in the way of disinfection of
Whooping Cough-infected houses, exclusion of children (both
infected and from infected houses), and the educating of parents
up to the dangerous nature of the disease and the importance of
careful nursing of the patients when suffering from this
complaint. Unfortunately, Whooping Cough, like Measles, is
regarded as a harmless complaint of childhood, and the ignorance