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22
The results of analysis of the heights and weights, as was to be expected from
the disturbance of war time conditions, show more individual fluctuations in the
increase of height and weight than in pre-war years when the children were living
under more stable conditions.
On the average, the rates of growth, age for age, which are a valuable indication
of nutrition, have been maintained at the same level or are. in some areas, slightly
above the pre-war rates.
Speaking generally, there was less improvement among the younger than the
older children.
This is in keeping with the doctors' findings that nutritional progress of the
entrants was not relatively so good as that of the older children.
Vitamin
investigation
During the year an investigation into the value of giving capsules containing
vitamins A, B, C and D was carried out among some 400 boys attending London
elementary day schools, and about 200 boys in an evacuated special party in a
camp school in the country.
A capsule was given to alternate boys on each school day, and a similar, but
innocuous and non-active capsule was given in the same way to the other boys.
All the boys were medically examined and weighed and measured at the beginning
of the investigation, and again at the end of about seven months by the same doctor.
Detailed analysis of the results showed that taking vitamins under these conditions
had no appreciable effect on the general health of the boys. It was, however,
interesting to find that the boys living in the camp school in the country (who came
from homes in London comparable with those of the boys attending the day schools)
grew, on the average, slightly more in height and weight than the boys attending
London day schools.
Nutritional
survey
Reference has been made earlier in this report to the suspension of the term by
term nutritional survey. The survey made serious incursions into the time of teachers,
doctors and nurses, but the suspension was decided upon following careful consideration
and after a special investigation had been made. The investigation
concerned 218 children who were examined at routine inspections, and were within
a few days of these inspections seen in a cursory survey by (a) a divisional medical
officer, (b) an experienced school nursing sister and (c) the teachers in the same schools.
It was found that cursory surveys, even by experienced people, failed to detect
a number of important abnormalities which had been discovered by a full routine
inspection.
Dental
conditions
Dental conditions, which had retrogressed in the two previous years, now appear
to be again improving, a fact which is borne out by the results of inspections with
probe and mirror by the dental surgeons, who in 1942 found that of 103,285 children
inspected by them, 77,692 required treatment or 75.2 per cent. as compared with
79.4 per cent. of 62,631 children inspected in 1941, and 69 per cent. in 1938 when
292,971 children were inspected.
Cleanliness
A welcome improvement is noted in the conditions of the hair and in the incidence
of skin diseases. This improvement noted by the medical staff is confirmed
by the results of the nurses' examinations for personal hygiene. Possibly the
increase previously noted in war-time years of these "minor horrors of war" has
been arrested, which may conceivably be due to the greater efforts on the part of
the school and sanitary authorities reinforced by the Scabies Order, 1941, to combat
these verminous infestations.
Bathing of
school
children
The Council in 1941 decided to accept the offer of a private firm to provide
free of cost the use of a mobile bathing unit for bathing school children in the
Bermondsey district; the facilities were extended later to schools in Deptford,
Greenwich, Camberwell, Poplar and Stepney.
The unit consists of a Diesel-engined wagon containing water-heating plant
and a trailer for carrying the bathing booths, which are divided into undressing,
shower-bath and dressing cubicles. Soap, towels, bathing caps and supervision