View report page

80
willing to accept casual work when it offers, or even to
engage regularly in such work as street hawking, officecleaning,
etc. And it would appear that what harm
might be done by factory work is more than compensated
for by the better and more regular food the
mother is thus enabled to obtain. Housework seems
to be at least as bad for the expectant mother. The
women themselves often attribute difficulty and danger
at confinement to their having had to do heavy
washing, or to carry weights (e.g. water) up and down
stairs to and from their rooms. One woman who was
greatly distressed about her stillborn baby, said that it
was killed while she was moving the bed in preparing
her room for her confinement.
During the hot summer months much attention
was given to infants and young children suffering from
Diarrhoea. Every case that came to our knowledge
was visited, most cases repeatedly. It was found
necessary in some cases to see that the feeding bottles,
milk jugs, etc., were properly washed, that the bedding
was clean, and the child changed as required; that the
Doctor's instructions were carried out, and even that
the mother understood and knew how to do what she
had been told.
It is believed at present that insanitary home
conditions, and the contamination of food there and
elsewhere are responsible for Summer Diarrhœa. But
undoubtedly other factors should be taken into
consideration, for I have remarked repeatedly that in
Bethnal Green many of the children who died from
this complaint lived in clean homes. Possibly they