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39
vaccinated with the result that the further spread of the disease was
quickly stayed. So effectual has this practice been in stopping the spread
of Small Pox in common lodging houses, and further in that of the
private houses of the Borough which become infected from the lodginghouses,
that the disease from a public health point of view gives us now
but little concern.
In the epidemic of 1901-2, the infection of the district by hawkers
and tramps from common lodging houses was distinctly apparent, and it
was found when these undesirable persons had been vaccinated the
disease in the rest of the Borough quickly subsided.
I am satisfied that on the approach of any future epidemic, it will be
to the interest of the ratepayers of Southwark to expend money as soon
as possible on the vaccination of the occupants of the common lodginghouses
within its borders.
So far, the vaccination of these persons has fallen upon the Medical
Officer of Health, and with the present arrangements for public
vaccination I am unable to see how that can be avoided. In any future
Vaccination Act provision will most likely be made for the compulsory
vaccination of these hawkers and tramps with the other common lodginghouse
residents. The waste of public money by the present system of
simply treating Small Pox without adopting the known means of preventing
it, exemplifies once more one of our chief national characteristics.