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Report of the Medical Officer of Health.
151
REPORT OF JOINT SUB-COMMITTEE OF PUBLIC
HEALTH AND HIGHWAYS COMMITTEE ON
THE VENTILATION OF SEWERS.
The Joint Sub-Committee consisting of the following Members
of the Public Health Committee, Alderman Anderson, Councillors
Gay and Swain, and of the Highways, Sewers, and Lighting
Committee, Councillors Lance, Lorden, and Wise, appointed to
enquire into the question of the ventilation of sewers has held
five Meetings at which were also present The Mayor, Councillor
Cusden (by invitation), the Medical Officer of Health, and the
Surveyors.
The Committee has mainly considered the best method of
ventilating sewers to avoid complaints arising from them, and
what, if any, definite plan can be devised for the closing of road
gratings and erection of shafts.
The Committee had before it a report from the Medical
Officer of Health with tables compiled from inquiries as to the
conditions existing in the large towns in Englands, and spot maps
shewing the incidence of diseases and localisation of complaint
from the Surveyors with plans and maps of the sewers in the
Borough and several letters from Mr. Councillor Cusden advocating
the necessity of closing all road gratings and removing
the interceptor traps on house drains, thus allowing the soil pipe
ventilators of private houses to act as a large additional number of
shafts, and the best arrangement for connecting the usual shafts
to the crown of the sewers.
After careful examination of all the points, the following
statements and suggestions are made for the future management
of the sewers, and of complaints in connection with them.
i.—That while there is clear evidence of the production by
sewer air of sore throat, gastro-intestinal disturbances and indefinite
forms of disease, and of lowered vitality predisposing to
disease, more especially when carried into houses, there is no
modern evidence to show that such specific diseases as Diphtheria
or Enteric Fever are caused by its inhalation, but on the contrary,
in such diseases there is probably an entirely different cause.