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24
The general lines of action in regard to school closure
and exclusion recommended by the Medical Officers of the Local
Government Board and of the Board of Education are set out
in the "Memorandum on closure of and exclusion from
school" issued in 1909. In that memorandum it is recommended
"that children attacked by Measles should be kept
from school for four weeks."
In large districts, and in the smaller districts in which the
majority of children over seven years of age who are attending
public elementary schools have had Measles, the practice
is frequently adopted, when Measles breaks out in a household,
of excluding from school attendance only those children
of the same household who attend the infant school, and those
older children of the same household who have not had
Measles. These particular children of the same household
should be excluded from school until 21 days from the date
of the illness of the last patient with Measles in the house.
The above procedure can be recommended as the result of
experience in large districts. It is a compromise which is
obviously not a counsel of perfection, and may need future
modification. Even under present conditions the procedure may
need to be modified in accordance with the special circumstances
of a particular district, with special reference to its
past history as to Measles. The schedules for the medical
inspection of school children, if kept carefully, will, in course of
time, place at the disposal of the Medical Officer of Health
and of the School Medical Officer the history of each child as
to Measles, as well as to other infeotious diseases, and they
will thus be able to decide, when a case of Measles occurs in
a particular class, which scholars in that class should, and
which should not, be excluded from attendance at school.
School closure has probably more frequently taken place
on account of epidemics of Measles than for any other disease,