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79
the Education Department to encourage attendance at
school of children of that age period — has resulted,
during the past twenty years, in a very large number
of children between three and five years of age having
passed through the infants departments of the public elementary
schools, and many outbreaks of disease, more especially
measles and whooping cough, have resulted therefrom, as
well as many deaths, and a very large amount of permanent
ill-health. It is most desirable, from a public health point of
view, that all children under five years of age should be
excluded from public elementary schools, having regard to
the amount of. infectious disease that occurs amongst children
of that particular age period. It is estimated that about
40,000 children under five years of age are at present in
attendance in public elementary schools throughout the
Administrative County of London, and it is stated that, if
the schools are closed against them, some other sort of
accommodation will have to be found, at least, for some of
them, viz.: créches, infants' nurseries, etc. In this connection,
it must be remembered that the conditions of school life
(crowded rooms, mental strain and fatigue) are such as
would not obtain in a créche or infants' nursery, and the
vital resistance of the young children will, consequently, be
greater in the latter case.
Finally, there is the question of the sanitary condition of
the school premises, or buildings—an important consideration.
Unless such buildings are kept in proper sanitary order
and condition, illness amongst the scholars and teachers
must of necessity follow. Lighting, ventilation, sanitary
arrangements, amount of floor space and cubic space per
child, etc., require careful attention both by the Board of
Education and by the Local Education Authorities, as, when
once the buildings have been erected within a district, they
fall under the sanitary supervision of the Sanitarv Authority
In the usual way. The importance of the Sanitary Authority,
therefore, being consulted in connection with all plans of
new school buildings goes without saying.
Such, then, are the factors which require consideration in
dealing with the medical inspection of schools and school
children, and the Borough Council, as the Sanitary Authority,
should have regard to the following headings:—