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5
With an ageing population there is a need to give consideration
as to whether the Public Health Services planned so many
years ago are meeting the present day requirements. Some of
the attention given to child welfare, with such marked success
over the past twenty-five years, should now be diverted to the
older population. Investigation should be made into all causes
of morbidity of the middle-aged, but until such morbidity is
notified to the Health Departments, we are hampered in our
investigations. The services of the Health Department of
Orpington are worthy of extension, and because Orpington is a
rapidly developing and progressive town, there is a greater need
than ever that the Council should have functional executive
powers of the day to day health services and so be master of its
own fate.
A full report on infectious diseases appears in the body of
the report. Scarlet Fever, whilst maintaining a high incidence,
is falling in severity and it is to-day rare indeed to have a death
from this disease and rarely do we see an acute case or one
causing any anxiety. Diphtheria in recent years shows :i
remarkably low incidence and there were no cases notified in
1950. Coincident with the fall in incidence and the absence of
deaths has been the increase in immunity as a result of preventive
innoculation, which has been an active service in Orpington
since 1928. It is, perhaps, too early to state categorically that
this is cause and effect. The increase in the virus diseases such
as poliomyelitis, a disease which appears to affect principally
the fit and well and a disease upon which the usual preventive
measures seem to have little effect, creates a new field of research
in the Public Health Department, and is also one that must
continue to give us anxiety.
At the end of the year the cesspool survey neared its
completion and I make reference to this in the text of the report.
The matter of cesspool drainage received the active attention
of the Health Committee throughout the year.
The increase of the caravan population in Orpington has now
become largely a matter to be dealt with under the Town and
Country Planning Act of 1947, but there must be tactful and
strict control to prevent nuisances as defined in the Public Health
Act.
There was one change of staff during the year—the
resignation of Mr. Taylor on his appointment as Surveyor and
Sanitary Inspector to the Borough of Buckingham, and the
appointment of Mr. Beddis to fill the vacancy.