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on the work of the Health Visitors and Maternity and Child Welfare
Centres under the control of the Council, and to set out in
detail the progress which had been made in such matters as
immunisation against diphtheria. As has already been stated on
more than one occasion, these services, all of which, incidentally,
are still under my personal control as Area Medical Officer, can
still be mentioned, although it would obviously be highly injudicious
to deal with them in other than a purely objective manner.
It will be appreciated, however, that there still remains a volume
of work which should be fully reported.
Without in anyway attempting to advance the claims of the
Public Health Department, it will be clear that the functions which
the Department performs have an intimate bearing on the health
and well-being, not only of the community, but of the individuals
who make up that community. This is neither the time nor place
to discuss the possible effects which the 1948 Act has had on the
health services of a borough such as Southgate. Although this is
a matter which intimately affects the district, previous comments
can be allowed to stand. It is our duty to do our utmost to see
that the system works, and that the very best is being made of the
various types of facility available.
So far as the Borough Council is concerned, we have our
statutory duties to perform, including the vast field of epidemiology.
It may be that our responsibilities will be increased in the relatively
near future, as the functions and value of environmental hygiene
come to be more generally appreciated. In addition, and this is
quite an important point, the Public Health Department has the
task of establishing liaison with such bodies as the Middlesex
County Council, the Regional Hospital Boards, and other statutory
organisations dealing with health, either preventive or curative
health. We have always striven to establish the most cordial relations
with these bodies. Indeed, it might not be too much to say
that co-operation has always been taken more or less as a matter
of course so far as Southgate is concerned.
It is still a fact that the position of the Medical Officer of
Health of a local authority which is not a local health authority is
not clearly defined at every point. Thus, the precise duties of the
Medical Officer of Health vis-a-vis the School Medical Officer in
regard to school exclusions is sometimes ambiguous, and can give
rise to more than theoretical difficulty when the two offices are not
held by the same person. Needless to say, this does not apply in
Southgate. In the same way, the responsibilities of the Medical
Officer of Health in relation to food hygiene still require clarification,
particularly in respect of certain types of canteens. Finally,
the position in regard to food sampling could, with advantage, be
simplified.
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