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59
additions, and for this purpose copies of the Model Health
Clinic demonstrated at the Glasgow Empire Exhibition in 1938,
and of the Central Health Clinic of the Southampton Planning
Committee of 1942 are enclosed.
It will be noted that the former only deals with the lay-out
of clinic rooms.
Maternity Hospital.
History tells us that the most promiscuous of men have not
fathered many children, that many of the Don Juans of the
past appear in fact to have been incapable of producing children,
so that the contemporary gibe that, if Louis XV was not the
father of all his people, he was of a great many of them, is
rather an inaccurate witticism.
Certainly human reproduction appears to be dominated by
emotion more than by any other physiological function, but how
far this may account for recent tendencies in the birthrate is
difficult to assess. It would appear, however, that there is
likely to be an increase in the number of births, at least during
the next few years.
The present plans of the Authority it will be remembered,
are for a new maternity home of twenty-two beds which but for
the present emergency would probably now be in being.
Lying-in accommodation can, of course, be provided either
in a separate hospital or in a maternity department of a general
hospital. As most cases in a maternity hospital are normal with
complications relatively rare and emergencies mainly obstetrical
in character, I would urge that a maternity home or hospital
is the more favourable project for an industrial borough. It is
my opinion that confinements of expectant mothers either in
a maternity hospital or a maternity home in an industrial area
will find favour in the future with an increasing number of
women. Admission to hospital for confinements should be
arranged through the ante-natal clinics with the co-operation
of the private practitioner, and the consultant obstetrician and
the institutional facilities of the area should be firmly linked
with the domiciliary, particularly with regard to staff.
During 1943 there were a total of 822 births in Erith and
I believe in the future that the greater proportion of these will
occur in the borough's municipal institution.
I would therefore suggest that the new maternity home
should contain at least sixty maternity beds; ten of these would
be for ante-natal patients, two to four beds for potential septic
cases, ten beds and cots would be reserved to meet the needs
of premature children in accordance with the recent Ministry
of Health Circular 20/44. I would suggest that there should