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5
REPORT OF THE MEDICAL OFFICER OF HEALTH FOR 1952
is no doubt that the greatest single factor making for success in this
form of administration is an abundance of good will and a determination
by all persons, both at Committee and officer level, to make
the system work through a community of effort. It is most gratifying
to be able to report that everybody concerned has shown the greatest
keenness to ensure the success of this venture.
I should like to record the great help and encouragement I have
personally received from the members of the Wandsworth Borough
Council, especially the members of the Wandsworth Public Health
Committee, and in particular from the two Health Committee
chairmen under whom I have served, namely, Alderman Mrs. C. E. F.
Callingham and Councillor T. V. Rowlands. I have greatly appreciated
and valued the help, encouragement and kindly advice
which has always been forthcoming at member level. In like measure
the Chief Officers of Wandsworth have done everything in their
power to make my first year in the borough a happy and successful
one, and if I mention Major R. H. Jerman, O.B.E., M.C., M.A.,
the Town Clerk, separately, it is because inevitably I have been most
closely in touch with him. All the staff of the Health Department
in all sections and grades have rendered me yeoman service and
every member has played his or her part in the work as a whole. I
should like particularly to mention my deputy, Dr. W. G. Harding,
who, like myself, was new to the borough. Dr. Harding has been
untiring in giving me every support and I am most grateful to him
for the loyal and efficient way in which he has done so, and for
ensuring that our contacts with other Departments and outside
bodies related to our work have been close and harmonious. The
Chief Sanitary Inspector, Mr. A. E. Vickers, has been most assiduous
in his efforts to make available to me his extensive experience of
sanitary work in general and of problems connected with the
borough in particular, and I am most appreciative of the great
help he has given me.
To everyone concerned, therefore, I would like to express my
warmest thanks for making my first year's work in Wandsworth
as much a pleasure as it has been a privilege. Eighteen months is not
a very long time and I have been deliberately cautious in making
this statement. My feeling at the moment, however, is that the
foundations of a permanent success have certainly been laid, and if
the very happy spirit which has so far permeated the whole of our
efforts at all levels can be continued, I see no reason why this method
of public health administration should not, in this area, prove
to be highly successful.
I have the honour to be,
Mr. Mayor, Ladies and Gentlemen,
Your obedient servant,
J. TUDOR LEWIS,
Medical Officer of Health.