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older practitioners have been replaced by younger men, who
are anxious to attend, and are taking on, a good many midwifery
cases. In addition to these, since the foundation of
the Hostel, the Bermondsey Guardians have established a
very excellent Maternity Ward in the Bermondsey and
Rotherhithe Hospital, at very low fees to the patients, and
during the first nine months of 1923 they had 328 cases in the
ward. A further factor has come in, inasmuch as Guy's
Charity, which used to cover about a third of the Borough,
now covers nearly the whole Borough, so that practically
every woman living in Bermondsey who is going to be confined,
and cannot afford the usual fees, can be attended free
from Guy's Hospital. From a consideration of all these
factors it is quite evident that the need for the Hostel has
passed. From the first almost it was evident that unless we
opened the doors free we were hardly likely to get hold of the
class of patient who seemed most in need of help, and, as a
matter of fact, this has been so. By far the large majority
of patients belong to the artisan and clerical class, who apply
to be received into the Hostel more as a matter of convenience
than of necessity. I think, therefore, that the Committee
might seriously take into consideration as to whether
it is wise for us to continue the Hostel. It is a great expense
for which we do not seem to get an adequate return, and it
seems to me that the money we spend here could be laid out
with much greater benefit in some other direction. As regards
the use of the premises, we are in great need of proper
accommodation for the Maternity and Child Welfare Centre,
which is now carried on at the Shelter in the Depot. This
Shelter was originally built at considerable expense to take
contacts, who were unable to stay in their own homes during
the process of disinfection, and also for the reception of contacts
in the initial stages of dangerous epidemic diseases such
as small-pox and typhus, and I can say that we have on
several occasions stopped an epidemic, which threatened to
spread, by the timely housing of contacts in this Shelter.