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seventy-five cases and then in consultation with the County Medical
Officer's Department and the Public Health Laboratory Service, Colindale,
it was arranged, on June 12th, to take stool specimens from all children
(450) at the school. This resulted in us finding 158 children
positive and some 65 relatives of them also positive.
A strict hygiene drill was instituted at the school including
dipping of hands in a suitable disinfectant, hand washing, cleansing and
disinfection of water closets, taps, etc., and also a reversal of the
normal procedure of exclusions so that the school work could continue
almost as normal. Family contacts attending other schools were
excluded, as also were food handlers.
Following appropriate treatment by their general practitioners,
further stool specimens were taken from all children at the school
resulting in only twenty-five "positives". The last known case in
or connected with the school was cleared of infection on 12th August.
Although some families had children attending two or sometimes
three schools there was no outbreak at those other schools.
I would like to place on record my appreciation of the co-operation
and assistance received from the teaching staff, Whitings Hill School
and all the parents of children at that school.
Early in December, a minor outbreak of Sonnei Dysentery occurred at
the St. Andrews School, Totteridge. No connection was found with the
earlier outbreak in Barnet.
On receiving notifications of two cases in school children the strict
hygiene drill was instituted at the school straightway.
The last known date of onset in a child was 23rd December and in an
adult on 28th December. The total number of cases was twenty-five
(seventeen school children and eight family contacts) with no further
complications with other schools.