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109
Poor Law cases must be kept separate and distinct from other
cases. All experience goes to show that, except in a few instances,
there is a definite, deep-rooted prejudice in the minds of most people
against the Workhouse Maternity Wards for confinements, as there is
in connection with other Departments of Poor Law Administration.
The same prejudice, though to a much lesser degree, is noticeable in
connection with Lying-in Hospitals and the Maternity Departments of
General Hospitals. Voluntary or Municipal Maternity Homes are
preferred, and there is a wide-spread want for such semi-private
Institutions throughout the Borough of Lambeth, judging by the
success of the West Norwood Maternity Home in the West Norwood
District.
To deal with such cases at Hospitals would not, in the opinion of
the Medical Officer of Health, be feasible, any more than it would be
feasible to deal with Hospital cases in Poor Law Institutions. Class
distinction, or class prejudice (call it by whatever name) is too strong.
Such a maternity scheme for the Borough of Lambeth would be
an acquisition, and would tend to give control over the whole of the
maternity work of the Borough to the Maternity and Child Welfare
Committee—more control than that Committee is at present able to
exercise, except in an indirect manner. All expectant mothers (except
private cases) should be attached to Centres, to which should be
connected ante natal clinics as well as post-natal clinics, and expectant
mothers should be encouraged to book their confinements through the
various Welfare Centres—Poor Law cases to be sent to the Poor Law
Institutions, Hospital cases (i.e., persons who are willing to go into a
hospital for confinement) to the Hospitals, and Municipal Maternity
Home cases (i.e., persons who are not only willing but desirous to go
into a semi-private voluntary maternity home, but who at the same
time object to anything in the nature of an Institution, whether in
the form of a hospital or a Poor Law Infirmary) to the Municipal
Maternity Homes, of which two should be provided for the Borough,
i.e., one for the Inner Districts of the Borough, in addition to the
West Norwood Maternity Home, which practically serves the Outer
Districts.
It will be noticed that the Medical Officer of Health is very
definitely of opinion that the Council would be ill advised to interfere
in any way with the present West Norwood Maternity Home, which was