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Canal boats.—The Regent's canal passes in its course across St. Pancras through three of the
sanitary inspectors' districts, and two of the inspectors have authority to inspect canal boats. Only
thirty-three inspections were made last year, and it appears that H.M. chief inspector of canal
Boats has called attention in strong terms to the need of increased supervision being exercised. The
amount of cubic space required in the cabins of these boats is extremely inadequate. I inspected a
boat lying in the canal within the St. Pancras boundary, registered for five persons, the cabin of which
had a capacity of less than 300 cubic feet.
Disinfection, &c.—The disinfecting station, situated in Cambridge-street, on the east side of
St. Pancras-gardens, is supplied with a steam disinfecting apparatus in which upwards of 30,000
articles were disinfected last year. There is, moreover, a furnace for the destruction, as distinguished
from the disinfection, of infected articles. A shelter for the accommodation of families during disinfection
of their rooms was erected in 1893. It contains four separate rooms, each supplied with cooking
apparatus, and having a bath and lavatory attached. At first sleeping accommodation was not provided,
it being intended that the shelter should be used by day only. Inasmuch, however, as the
process of disinfection of rooms was not completed in twenty-four hours, it was found that the absence
of sleeping accommodation greatly militated against the usefulness of the shelter. Since the beginning
of last year some of the rooms at the shelter have been furnished as bedrooms. During 1897 the
shelter was used by 22 families.
There would be great advantage in systematically applying the process of "room disinfection"
to the many vermin-infested rooms in St. Pancras. In one or two instances I found the inhabitants
of such rooms attempting to destroy vermin by means of sulphur fumes. In the case of rooms
requiring such treatment the efforts of the amateur are, however, of little or no avail.
Sanitary administration.
The staff of the health department includes eight inspectors, who have each a district allotted
to them, and two inspectors, a man and a woman, who are deputed to inspect workshops. There are
thus ten sanitary inspectors in all. The present inspectors' districts are defined by the boundaries of
parliamentary sab-divisions. The four divisions (North, South, East and West St. Pancras) each have
five sub-divisions. Two inspectors are allotted to each division, one of these two officers taking two
sub-divisions, the other three sub-divisions of the particular division. The average number of
inhabitants in a sanitary inspector's district in St. Pancras is about 30,000, the population per sanitary
inspector being considerably larger than in London as a whole. It is estimated that the approximate
number of houses in the several inspectors'districts varies from 2,562 in the district which includes
the streets in the neighbourhood of Tottenham-court-road, to 4,568 in the district which extends on
either side of Camden-road.
In view of these facts, it is not surprising to learn that the time of a St. Pancras district
inspector is almost wholly taken up in the supervision of drainage work, in inspecting markets, and in
making inquiry into written complaints received by the sanitary authority and concerning notified
cases of infectious disease. Such time as he has had to spare he has been directed in the past to
devote to house-to-house inspection, and it appears that during the years 1894-95-96-97, 23 streets,
consisting of 598 houses, have been inspected house to house. This shows progress at the rate of
only about 18 houses inspected per inspector per year. Over and above this question of house-tohouse
inspection, there are several important branches of work for the execution of which the St.
Pancras staff of inspectors requires to be strengthened.
The facts as to houses let in lodgings in St. Pancras and the evils resulting from the nonenforcement
of the by-laws under sec. 94 of the Public Health London Act, have already been full}'
discussed; a second section of the Public Health London Act, which is at present practically a
dead letter in St. Pancras, is that relating to underground rooms; further, a greater power of control
of workshops is required in the parish, and more attention should be devoted to the inspection of food.
Of these branches of work the first will make the greatest demand upon the resources of the health
department. The number of houses especially needing to be controlled by by-laws is greater in some
of the districts than in others, and notably greatest in sub-divisions 4 and 5 of the east division. It is
necessarily difficult to gauge the number of houses which will ultimately require to be registered, but
special power of control is at the present time urgently required with regard to some 2,000 houses, about
400 to 500 of which are situated in each of the north, west and south divisions, and a somewhat larger
number in the east division, particularly in sub-divisions 4 and 5 of this division. The inspectorial
work necessary for dealing with this number of houses will take up the whole time of at least four
inspectors. A considerable amount of additional clerical work will moreover be entailed in carrying
out the work of registration and regulation of this number of houses.
Each district inspector is charged with carrying out food inspection and duties under the Food
and Drugs Act in his own district. For these duties he has practically very little time, overburdened
as he is with other work. On every Saturday evening, and on the morning of every fourth Sunday, in
the summer he does in fact inspect "markets ;" further, he devotes such time as he can spare to observation
of markets and market streets on week-days, and he is instructed on occasions to purchase
samples of particular articles for analysis.
If officers with special knowledge were appointed for the purpose of inspecting food, such officers
also carrying out the provisions of the Food and Drugs Act, and for dealing with smoke nuisance, at
least two would be required for this purpose. For the inspection of workshops at least one additional
officer is required.
I estimate therefore that for the purpose of the duties now imposed upon the Health Department
at least seven additional inspectors, together with additional clerical assistance, are required, and in
making this estimate I have taken into consideration that there would be economy in certain officers
devoting the whole of their time to special duties over the whole district.
W. H. Hamer,
Assistant Medical Officer of Health.