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11
722 children who came to the Minor Ailment Clinie for treatment
by the Doctor and Nurse; these children made 3,260 attendances.
It is obvious that the Minor Ailment Clinic is doing
very good work, and is providing medical treatment and advice
for children who otherwise would be without it.
AN OPEN-AIR SCHOOL.
Children suffering from chronic bronchitis, chronic heart
affections, uræmia, early tuberculosis, malnutrition and some
other insidious conditions can derive great benefit by instruction
in the open-air. This benefit is increased when the child is
away from home conditions that are detrimental to health, and
when it is living a clean and well-regulated life in an open-air
school. Sunlight and the fresh air of the country, away from
the smoke and dirt of a big city, are tonics which are far more
valuable than any that are sold in bottles; but unfortunately
they are more expensive than the bottle of the chemist's physic,
and are therefore out of reach of those children whose parents
are not well-to-do. There are, of course, a few exceptions, and
poor children are now and again sent away by charitable persons
to convalescent homes; but for the majority of the ailing children
whom such open-air treatment would benefit this form of treatment
is not procurable; and, owing to the lack of it, many a
child drifts into a condition of chronic invalidism.
I should like the Education Committee and the Town
Council to consider whether, in the future, it might not be
possible to provide an open-air school for some of the children
who need it. Possibly it might be desirable and economical to
combine with the Maternity and Child Welfare Committee for
this purpose; and to provide a home in the country where mothers
and babies might stay for convalescence, and where school
children might live and be instructed under open-air conditions.
I think in this Borough it would always be possible to find halfa-dozen
mothers and little children who would benefit by a two
months' holiday in such a home; and possible also to find twenty
or thirty school children to whom a two months' holiday in the
country would be of immense benefit. In addition to these
there are perhaps a dozen children whose residence at such an
open-air school should be of much longer duration. It would