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for healthy living. Means are insufficient to afford a separate
bedroom, or even a separate bed, for the patient, or for providing
receptacles for the reception of sputa. Fuel for maintaining
the home at a reasonable temperature is difficult to obtain,
consequently ventilation is restricted. Again, separate eating
and drinking utensils for the sufferer are from the same cause
unobtainable.
So that when a working man becomes tuberculous it may
excite no wonder that he becomes the centre of infection
to his family, and that other members of the family acquire the
disease if he is treated for his malady at home. The question of
prevention of the spread of tuberculosis is bound up with the
question of dealing with the poverty incident with the onset of
the disease.
The Local Authority has power to do certain things for the
prevention of the spread of infection from this disease. The
following quotation from Article IX. of the Regulations already
referred to sets out these powers:—
ARTICLE IX. (2) Subject as aforesaid, a Council, on the
advice of their Medical Officer of Health, in the case of a poor
person in relation to whom a notification in pursuance of these
Regulations, has been posted to the Medical Officer of Health,
may, for the purpose of preventing the spread of infection from
Pulmonary Tuberculosis,—
(a) Take all such measures, or do all such things as are
authorised, in any case of infectious disease, or of dangerous
infectious disease, by any enactment relating to
public health, and as have reference to the destruction
and disinfection of infected articles, or the cleansing or
disinfecting of premises.