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51
Nursery Dietaries. In February, 1943 the Chief Medical
Officer, Ministry of Health, had occasion to address a letter to
Medical Officers of Health of Welfare Authorities drawing attention
to the ascertained fact that the nutritional condition, particularly
of children in the 1-2 age group of nursery children was not as good
as it should be; and this he considered to be somewhat disturbing
in view of the fact that extra rations and special vitamins were
available for these children. Medical Officers were therefore
advised to review the nursery dietaries. In Leyton, at the time
the nurseries were opened, the question of adequate dietaries was
considered very carefully by Dr. Menzies and the Matrons. Since
that time there has been available for each child not only cod liver
oil and fruit juice daily, but suitable preparations containing iron
have been administered to each child who was considered to require
them. These facts regarding available dietaries should be considered
in association with the observations made by Dr. Menzies
at the end of this report.
Progress made by Children attending Day Nurseries
Recently there has been much controversy regarding the progress
made by children attending day nurseries. There are those who
state that children attending day nurseries make better progress
than children cared for at home. On the other hand, there is a
growing body of medical opinion which considers that children
(especially those under two years of age) make much better progress
at home, where they are not exposed to infectious disease in
massive doses at so early an age. Unfortunately, the amount of
evidence adduced so far is surprisingly small, and most of it is far
from being of much scientific value.
The only satisfactory way to conduct a proper investigation of
this kind would be for accurate records to be kept of—
(a) a number of children attending a day nursery, and
(b) an equal number of comparative children kept at home ;
and, in order to narrow the margin of error as much as possible, it
would be necessary for the same observers to investigate the progress
of as many children as possible in each group over as long a period
as possible.
Unfortunately war-time day nurseries were established when
the depleted staffs of health departments were fully occupied in