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The incidence of infectious disease was again very low.
Once again no case of diphtheria occurred but it is still very
necessary that mothers should not fail to have their children
immunised as only thus can a continued freedom from this
disease be ensured. Two paralytic cases of poliomyelitis
occurred in the District compared with none in the previous
year. The number of cases of tuberculosis during 1954 was
39 compared with 45 during 1953. The number of deaths,
however, was only 4 as against 11 in 1953. A comparison of
notifications and deaths over the past 10 years is in keeping
with the national tendency for deaths from this disease to
decrease at a greater rate than notifications. In other words,
the curative services are tending to outstrip the preventive
services and very much more needs to be done to track down
the infectious cases within the community and to lessen the
chances of infection of susceptible persons.
During the year a survey was commenced in accordance
with Section 1 of the Housing Repairs and Rents Act, 1954,
to ascertain how many houses would require to be demolished
within the next five years and it was found that the number
of obviously unfit houses was relatively small as was to be
expected in an area in which so much housing development
took place between the two wars. The demolition of these
houses will not, necessarily, be followed by 100% replacement
on the cleared sites as some of these may be considered
unsuitable for new houses. The rehousing of these tenants
may, therefore, be a matter of some difficulty but it is hoped
that the rate of demolition will be such as to allow for the
assimilation of such families into the Council's rehousing
programme in general.
The Clean Food Campaign continued to make real, if
not spectacular progress, and at the time of writing 156
plaques have been awarded by the Bexley, Erith and Crayford
Clean Food Traders' Guild. Far more could, no doubt,
be achieved if the necessary staff were available, and, indeed,
this applies to Health Education in general. A good case
could be made for the appointment of a Health Education
Officer to serve an area sufficiently large to provide sufficient
scope for activity.
The work of the Bexley, Erith and Crayford Home Safety
Committee is gaining momentum and will, undoubtedly, increase
the scope of its activities in the near future. Our
thanks are due to the Woolwich and Dartford Hospital
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