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1909
154
(4) That it will afford an opportunity of maintaining some observation
over consumptive patients, so as to ensure that they continue to take
precautionary measures.
(5) That it will afford an opportunity of inquiring into the possible source
of the infection.
(6) That it will enable information to be gleaned as to the conditions
under which the patient worked, which is a most important matter,
because ill-ventilated workshops have been most fruitful sources of this
disease. And it will enable special attention to be drawn to the habit
of spitting, which is so common in these places.
(7) That it will afford an opportunity of obtaining information as to the
part different occupations or trades play in the distributoin of the
disease.
In reporting on this compulsory notification to the Public Health Committee
on January 25th, 1909, the Medical Officer of Health said:—
"Naturally, the very first requirement by the Sanitary Authority would be
the employment of a trained official, or a Health Visitor, whose duty it would be
to point out to these poor people the danger they may be to their families and
the public if they do not adopt preventive methods, and to instruct them as
to the best methods to be adopted, and then to visit them periodically to see
that these instructions have been carried out. The good tidings will also be
borne to these afflicted people that the disease is not necessarily a fatal one,
but that by the adoption of a proper mode of living, cleanliness, and the
proper means for ventilating their rooms, they may prolong their lives, if
indeed, they do not save them.
"Secondly, the Sanitary Authority will be enabled to place in the hands
of these poor people printed instructions as to what they are to do, or if they
should be children, then into the hands of their parents and guardians. But I
must confess that I do not anticipate much good to accrue by these methods
unless they are followed up by visits from a qualified person to explain them
and to see that they are carried out.
"My views on this matter, which are those of every Medical Officer of
Health, are, I think, already understood by this Committee, so that I do not