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7
"The administration of this department of the Council's work is, we are
pleased to say, very satisfactory, and, with the exception of a few suggestions,
"relating principally to the duties of the Sanitary Inspectors, whom we have
"interviewed, we have no recommendations to make."
One of the principal changes in the Works Department, affecting the
administration and work of the Public Health Department, which has taken place
during the year on account of the above investigation, was the transference of the
supervision of the removal of house and trade refuse from the Borough Surveyor's
Department to the Public Health Department, as was also suggested in my report
to that Committee. The Borough Surveyor used to have two dust inspectors; these
were not transferred to this department; so that the work has to be done by this
department without any increased staff. The change took place on the 26th June,
1905. Soon afterwards I reported to the Public Health Committee that there had
been many breaches of the contract respecting the bi-weekly removal of refuse, and
on the 26th July, the Council adopted the recommendation of the Public Health
Committee, "that the Council do impose the penalty under his contract on the
"contractor for neglecting or failing to remove house refuse from houses in the
"Borough at least twice weekly as required by the contract." In consequence of
this the contractor was fined £100, and after this the contract was carried out much
more satisfactorily.
The other principal changes during the year were:—
Information giving details of births were supplied by the Sub-Registrars, so
that houses of the working classes where births had taken place are now visited by
the Lady Sanitary Inspector with a view to the reduction of preventable infantile
mortality by greater care and attention to the feeding of infants, and one of our
leaflets is left if thought desirable.
In order to reduce the large amount of preventable illness and the enormous
sacrifice of infant life due to improper feeding, modified milk has been provided in
a great many towns in European countries and America. In England various milk
depots have been established. Those in London being Battersea, Fulham, Lambeth
and Woolwich, the last of which is not yet completed. As a supply of modified
milk by this method in Holborn would be very costly, I endeavoured to arrange
with the Express Dairy Company, Limited, to supply modified milk for infants
of the working classes for about the same charges as at municipal milk depots.
After much consideration the Company agreed to supply it at the reduced rate
of 4d. (instead of 6d.) per day per infant. This prepared milk is supplied as
at municipal milk depots in bottles in a basket, each bottle contains sufficient milk
for one meal, the number of bottles and the modification of the milk varying with
the age of the child. The milk is thus kept clean and free from infection or
contamination.