View report page

5
INTRODUCTION
To the Chairman and Members of the Public Health Committee.
I have the honour to present my report on the health of the Borough
during 1962.
The year was memorable in many respects. A final decision has
been taken in delineating the area to constitute in 1965 a new London
Borough of which Beckenham joined to Penge will constitute the
north-western sector.
To the new Health Authority will come control of the Maternity
and Child Welfare Service, the Welfare and the Children's Service.
Welfare incorporates those special services which provide for the
elderly including the maintenance of old persons homes and those
services which provide for the Blind and Partially Sighted, the Deaf and
Hard of Hearing and the Physically Handicapped. The Children's
Service supervises adoptions and provides foster homes, family group
homes and nurseries for children in care or deprived of parental care
and remand homes and approved schools for children referred by
Juvenile Courts. Thus the new Health Committee will have tremendous
community health responsibilities for closely linked functions in the
Children's Services, Personal Health and Welfare Services, while
retaining the same responsibilities to a population five times larger than
at present for the environmental services of Food Hygiene, Housing,
Clean Air, Health and Sanitation.
In the light of these changes it is pleasing to record the steady
progress during the year of the Clean Air Programme, of the hygienic
control of food and drugs during which no adulteration was found, of
the work of the Old Peoples Welfare Committee whose voluntary
efforts to provide day centres and increased housing and meals, has
the full financial support of the Council and of the development of
health education in the special sphere of the Home Safety Programme
by the approved appointment of additional staff. This progress
emphasises that the Committee through the Council keeps itself up to
date in providing for the needs of today in the more limited field of
health and welfare.
Vital Statistics
The report reveals a slow but steady growth in population, a
Death Rate of 11.53 which compares favourably with that of 11.9 for
the rest of England and Wales, and an increase of live births which now
number over one thousand a year. The birth rate of 13.6 is still less
than that for England and Wales (18.0).
Cancer deaths show a steady increase over the past five years as do
deaths from Tuberculosis but the cause in both events may be due to
earlier diagnosis and increasing longevity. The Death Rate from
accidents has increased and there has been a regrettable increase in
illegitimate births, illegitimate infant deaths and of still births. While