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Medicinal Baths and Treatment Centre
General
The year under review has been notable as a period of constantlychanging
Transport Staff. In the past we have been extremely fortunate in
having the services of four drivers over a period of many years. However,
due to age, one driver had to be taken from this duty and the three other
drivers secured other appointments. As a result, during the year we
had nine different drivers over a period of a few months. Inexperience,
unfamiliarity with the routes and, in addition, some extremely poor
driving resulting in a number of accidents, caused considerable difficulties
to the services.
The usual quota of medical students and nurses has been received
during the year. They are given a very thorough insight into all aspects
of our varied work and great interest is invariably shown.
Cleansing and treatment of persons

Of the treatments for body lice, more than 50% were for men from a
large hostel in the Borough. In addition, work was carried out on behalf
of other London Boroughs for 350 patients who received 588 treatments,
Steam and Chemical Sterilisation
Requests for this service have remained reasonably static. A total
of 364 collections for 10,914 articles were made. The increase of 1178
articles sterilised over the previous year was mainly because of work for
Fulham Hospital. Assistance was again rendered to the Boroughs of Ealing,
Hounslow, Richmond and Staines.
Disinfestation
The following table indicates the variety of work undertaken in this
section. This is believed to be the first year in which treatments to
eradicate bed bugs has not taken first place in the disinfestation table.
This was the year for fleas, with 581 rooms treated compared with 266
the previous year, The hot summer no doubt assisted the plague, animals
being blamed in most cases. However, in our opinion, greater use of that
modern aid to dustless conditions, the vacuum cleaner, would obviate many
of the requests received. There are exceptions to every rule, but many
of the complaints under this heading were due to lack of cleanliness. In
addition, 73 requests were received for assistance because of wasps. In
nine cases, the insects were found to be bees and no action was taken
beyond notifying local apiarists. Access to nests was not possible in
13 cases, but in 53 cases remedial action was taken and 19 nests were
actually destroyed.
B. 36