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METROPOLITAN BOROUGH OF CAMBERWELL.
DIPHTHERIA PREVENTION.
To Parents and Guardians.
DIPHTHERIA is a DANGEROUS disease causing great loss of life, particularly
amongst young children.
Some children, and grown up people, do not catch diphtheria because they are
protected by Nature against it.
Other children who are not immune may contract the disease.
Do you know that your children need not have diphtheria, they can be made
immune.
HOW CAN THIS IMMUNITY BE SECURED?
By a simple and painless test it is possible to find out whether your child is
susceptible to diphtheria infection. If the test shows that your child is not protected
owing to the absence of protective substances in the blood, it can be
inoculated and rendered immune. The process is quite harmless and the protection
lasts for many years, if not for life.
WILL THE PROTECTING INJECTIONS UPSET THE CHILD?
Not one in a hundred children is unwell after the injections. There is no sore
at the point of injection, and no scar is left.
GIVE YOUR CHILDREN ALL THE ADVANTAGES YOU CAN.
Do you realise the severity of diphtheria ? In England and Wales eighty of
every hundred deaths from this disease occur in young children under ten years of
age, most are under five years.
It is your duty therefore to consider whether your child should be rendered
immune to this disease.
WHEN AND WHERE TREATMENT CAN BE OBTAINED.
The Camberwell Borough Council has opened a Clinic at the Maternity and
Infant Welfare Centre, 140, Camberwell Road, where children from six months old
can be brought on Wednesday afternoons from 2.30 to 4 for the purpose of inoculation
free of charge. Treatment is not compulsory, but in the interest of your child it is
strongly recommended.
H. W. Barnes, M.8., B.Ch., D.P.H., Medical Officer of Health.
The clinic was opened on December 1st, 1926, and although
it is too early to speak of the results at this stage, nevertheless I
am hopeful, and the attendances for the first month justify the
belief, that the people of Camberwell are beginning to realise the
danger of diphtheria.
It is advisable that immunisation should be carried cut as
soon as possible after the child reaches the age of six months,
but it may be many years before the acceptance of this new
principle for dealing with diphtheria prevention is sufficiently
established in the minds of the people.
In the meanwhile there will remain a large number of children
attending the elementary schools who are liable to contract this
disease at any time, and the question naturally arises as to the