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CITY OF WESTMINSTER
INTERIM REPORT
OF THE
MEDICAL OFFICER OF HEALTH
for the year 1940
Mr. Mayor, My Lord, Ladles and Gentlemen,
The Minister of Health has again required that the Annual
Report of the Medical Officer of Health on the health and sanitary
conditions of the City be in summarized form embodying statistics
necessary for future records.
In this foreword, however, it may be of interest to
mention briefly some of the activities of the Department carried out
in praecipe form in 1939, but transformed into grim realism in 1940.
The members of the Casualty Services, whether engaged in
Fixed First Aid Posts, Stretcher Parties or Mobile Aid Posts,
acquitted themselves with high courage and tenacity of purpose in
rendering aid to the victims of air warfare over the City. Indeed
some were themselves severely wounded, whilst a few lost their lives,
and among the latter one deplores the loss of W.A. Roust, Staff
Officer, of St. John Ambulance Brigade and Officer in Charge of
Stretcher Parties, a heroic and devoted officer. To the St. John
Ambulance Brigade and the British Red Cross the City Council is
deeply indebted. It is difficult to express due appreciation of
the unstinted co-operation given by those bodies in recruitment,
training and the detailed management of their units serving in the
City Council's Casualty Services. The personnel proved themselves
fully worthy-in the emergencies through which they were tested.
There were many victims who did not survive and the
measures originally planned for their reception had further to be
extended and improvised. The Council has already recorded its
appreciation of the work of the male staff of the Public Health
Department, mainly the Sanitary Inspectors who unflinchingly
volunteered ana faced up to a task entirely unfamiliar, naturally
distasteful, but which must needs be done. There were occasions
when almost the whole of the male staff were engaged in duties
connected with air raid fatalities.
A.R.P. Training. In this City, the Medical Officer of
Health, besides undertaking First Aid Training of Civil Defence
Personnel, has also within his reference general A.R.P. Training.
The Officer appointed by the City Council for this purpose,
and designated by the Ministry of Home Security "Training Officer",
is a member of the staff of the Medical Officer of Health, and he is
assisted by 6 full-time Instructors, and 1 part-time.
The scheme of training is in full accordance with the
Training Manuals Nos. 1 and 2, but while the special duties of each
service are the care of the head of that service, the Training Officer
co-ordinates the whole, when he takes complete control of exercises
in Combined Training.
The work of the Training Officer also extends to activities
such as the training of fire-guards, personnel for public cleansing
stations, demonstrations and lectures for the general public, public
gas tests, etc.