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swings in the opposite direction, so that individuals who have been
diagnosed as suffering from tuberculosis sometimes treat the matter
much too lightly. This, of course, is a very wrong attitude, which
should at once be corrected. Although the death rate from tuberculosis
has fallen and continues to fall, it is still a killing and
incapacitating disease which takes its toll year by year, month by
month of all age groups of the population.
As I have already said in this report, it is our duty to ensure
that all conditions which might encourage ill-health or the spread
of disease within the Borough are reduced to the absolute, practical
minimum. In no field is this more important than in the fight
against tuberculosis. It is here that the provision of adequate
housing, slum clearance, the abolition of overcrowding are so vitally
significant. As I have mentioned this fact on numerous occasions
in the past, I do not think I need labour it now.
Mass Radiography Unit 5B visited Southgate during 1956. On
this occasion the Medical Director of the Unit, Dr. Mikhail, set out
to provide the best possible service. No less than five sites were
selected in various parts of the Borough, at each of which the Unit
set up its headquarters for a number of sessions, most of them open
to the public. As always, the Public Health Department co-operated
wholeheartedly in the matter of publicity. There can be little
doubt that the burgesses of Southgate were given the fullest possible
opportunity to make use of this great diagnostic service. It is
equally obvious from the figures supplied by the Unit that good
advantage was taken of the opportunity. Set out below is a detailed
summary of the results obtained. These figures were kindly supplied
by Dr. Mikhail, to whom and to whose staff I would here record my
grateful thanks.
Total number X-rayed 2,976
Number not previously X-rayed 1,581
Percentage not previously X-rayed 53.12
Number not X-rayed within the last three
years 2,179
Percentage not X-rayed within the last three
years 73.21
Number of cases of active T.B. found 5
Rate per 1,000 1.68
Number of cases requiring occasional supervision
4
Percentage per 1,000 1.3
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