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106
the Town Hall, selected children should be examined bv myself or
by the assistant medical officer, and directions given for such treatment
as could be carried out at home, In some instances this might
well be supplemented by visits from the district nurse and by the
supervision of the Guild of Help. At present the parents are not
sufficiently persevering with treatment and many children are
allowed to become offensive who could at least be kept clean.
With our present staff we could, however, only deal with a proportion
of the children as the constantly increasing demands on the
time of your officers forbid our undertaking much additional work.
Children requiring operative interference should be referred to one
of the hospitals.
DENTAL TROUBLE. —About 80 per cent, of the older children
require the services of a dentist, while the mouths of about 5 per
cent, of the children are in such a condition as to urgently call for
treatment either for suppurating stumps, abscesses of the jaw, or
other septic conditions which are manifestly impairing their health.
This matter is so important, and there are so many difficulties
attached to any of the various schemes which have suggested themselves,
that I shall be glad if the whole question may be considered
by a Sub-Committee with a view of finding some practical solution
of the difficulty.
Finally, though it is clear that arrangements must eventually
be made by the Education Authority for securing definite medical
and surgical treatment for school children, it should be constantly
borne in mind that other methods of amelioration, though perhaps
not so obvious, are equally important and generally available
though requiring more time for the production of definite results.
I refer more particularly to the securing of healthier school conditions
and to the education of parents and children in the first principles
of healthy living. Take for instance the problem of tuberculous
children : obviously it is of the greatest importance to the sufferer
that medical and institutional treatment should be secured, but
improved ventilation of schools, the cult of the open window, intelligent
dieting, proper clothing, judicious physical exercises and
domestic hygiene generally will not only improve the condition of
the tuberculous, but will save many children from infection and
raise the standard of health of all school children. It is for this
last reason that these general measures are specially commeudable.
Efforts limited to the treatment of the physically defective may
possibly tend to produce racial degeneration, but, as Dr. McVail
points out, we are on perfectly safe ground if our measures are so
selected as to improve the health of the whole community.