View report page

died during the year, instead of 198. In other
words, 207 infants in Bethnal Green are alive today
because they had the good fortune to be born in
1923 under an enlightened Council and Ministry of
Health. But there is not only the saving in lite to
record; there is the improvement in health and
physique of the modern infant which will be reflected
in its after life. The new generation now being
reared in our midst will undoubtedly be bigger, handsomer,
more intelligent and healthier than the present
generation, better citizens and workers as well, and
that in spite of the bad environment in which so many
of them will be condemned to spend their lives.
PUERPERAL FEVER.
Seventeen cases of this complication of childbirth
were reported during the year. Eight of the patients
were removed to the London Hospital, three to Bethnal
Green Hospital, two to the Mothers' Hospital, Lower
Clapton Road, and three to the Metropolitan Asylums
Board Institutions. There were five deaths from the
disease.
OPHTHALMIA NEONATORUM.
Twenty-three cases of purulent eye-discharge in
the new-born were notified, one by a midwife, and the
remainder by doctors. In every case the condition
was cured without any apparent impairment of vision.
Fourteen cases received pursing attention at home
from the Shoreditch and Bethnal Green District
Nursing Association, the Borough Council paying
part of the cost: 338 visits were paid by nurses of
the Association.