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Plans for the proposed hostel for severely subnormal men have been passed and it is
therefore anticipated that actual work on the site will be started in the foreseeable future.
Efforts are being made to establish a day centre for chronic mentally ill and subnormal
patients and the search for premises continues.
A nursery unit for severely subnormal children was opened but owing to transport
difficulties this is at present limited in scope. It is hoped that when this problem has been
overcome severely handicapped children from all parts of the division will be able to attend.
DIVISION 3, comprising the boroughs of Finsbury, Holborn and Islington
Dr. W. G. Harding reports:
Maternity and child welfare—General practitioner obstetricians are now seeing their
booked maternity patients at nine welfare centres or sub.centres in the division.
Day nurseries—The high demand for day nursery places continued throughout the
year and the waiting list showed a disquieting upward trend. The situation was contained
only by the use of places in nurseries in adjoining divisions and by the exclusion of the less
urgent priority cases from nurseries in this division. By the autumn it had become apparent
that even the new 50-place nursery approved for south.west Islington was unlikely to meet
the need and that consideration would have to be given to providing yet another nursery
in the division.
The West London Mission opened a hostel at Aubert Park, N.5 for the care of ten
unmarried mothers with their babies and part of the hostel was adapted for use as a day
nursery where the children could be looked after whilst their mothers were at work. This
development was warmly welcomed. The nursery, which opened in July, is run as an annexe
to the Mission's main nursery in Holborn (Kingsway Creche) and has been registered as a
private day nursery under the Nurseries and Child.Minders Regulation Act. The undertaking
is grant.aided by the Council.
Health education—In October the division was visited by the Council's mobile health education
unit as part of a county.wide Smoking and Health campaign. During the visit 33 lectures
and film shows were given, mainly in Islington, to 5,890 children in 14 secondary schools;
four lectures and filmstrip showings were given to 700 children in four primary schools;
a youth club, two G.P.O. establishments and the Islington Town Hall provided facilities
for lectures and film shows to a total of 180 adults. Although schools and other establishments
visited warmly welcomed the health education team and provided lively question.
and.answer sessions after each lecture, it is regretted that there was such a meagre response
to the many letters which the borough medical officer of health of Islington sent out to
large firms and organisations as part of his whole.hearted co.operation in the venture:
only two, apart from the Islington Borough Council, took up the offer of a film show and
lecture and very few showed sufficient interest even to reply.
This was the first full working year of the division's evening smoking advisory clinic,
held at East Islington Welfare Centre, to which reference was made last year. The
average number of people attending a session was 13, with a high average of 21 in May
and low averages of seven in February and eight in December; about a quarter of the
people seen attended only once. The average age tended to fall (40.7 years up to July
1963, 37.7 years subsequently) and although more men than women attended the results
showed no statistical significance when analysed according to sex. The average daily
consumption of cigarettes at the time of the first visit to the clinic was 21 per head; this
dropped to an average of four per head at the lowest subsequent point attained, although
sometimes higher figures were recorded for individuals subsequently. Nearly 40 per cent.
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