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for, say, fifty or even twenty-five years ago, present a very pleasing
picture.
The remarks which appeared in the Annual Report for 1957
relating to work under the Housing Acts will be fully dealt with
in the appropriate section of the Report. It will only be necessary
to say here that it is now clear that houses or flats will presumably
soon be available to provide alternative accommodation for the
occupants of unfit houses. It should therefore be possible to continue
our work in this significant field in the very near future, work
which must be pressed forward until the problem of unfit houses
within the Borough is finally resolved. With this, of course, must
be included the provision of suitable accommodation for the elderly.
The position in regard to the setting up of smoke control areas
in Southgate proceeded according to plan during 1958. Here again,
this important question will be dealt with in greater detail in the
body of the Report.
The value of the liaison which I have been able to develop
between my duties as Medical Officer of Health of Southgate and
Area Medical Officer, Area No. 2, County of Middlesex, was
maintained, indeed intensified, during 1958. It would be quite
impossible in a Report such as this to elaborate the many ways in
which these links have been forged. One might, however, mention
two specific instances :
The closest and most harmonious co-operation has been maintained
between the Public Health Department and the Area Health
Office in the important matter of propaganda for vaccination against
poliomyelitis. This has proved of quite inestimable value, and has
undoubtedly been an extremely potent factor in establishing the
fact that the vaccination against polio rate for Southgate children
was shown to be amongst the highest in the county. Although the
vaccination rate as applied to the 15/26 age group is not so high as
the rate for the younger age groups, it would still appear that the
Southgate rate is at least as high, if not appreciably higher, than
that returned by the country as a whole. Here again, the co-operation
received from the Borough Council has been in no small
measure responsible for this happy result. I would again mention
the constant inter-change of information, and views which takes
place almost daily between the two departments, both housed in the
same Town Hall. This interchange is, of course, relatively easy,
as I am both Medical Officer of Health and Area Medical Officer.
But it is nevertheless a very great pleasure to me to be able to report
that the staffs of both Departments work in the closest harmony.
Altogether, the part which is being played by the Borough Council
in promoting the personal health of the burgesses of Southgate is
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