View report page

243
The Annual Report of the Chief Medical Officer of the
Board of Education for 1911 shows that in Willesden
115,386 dinners were provided to children in attendance in
Pubic Elementary Schools, at a total cost of 1,747. These
children are usually brothers and sisters of children under
five years of age, and the sons and daughters of expectant
mothers, and it would appear that all the reasons advanced
for feeding the older children apply with even more force
to the younger children and expectant and nursing mothers.
The average number of births per annum during the
five year period 1909-13 was 4,042, and if we assume that
each mother is to be fed during five months of pregnancy,
and nurses her child for a period of six months, the total
number of expectant and nursing mothers who may be fed
during any one year is 4,266. The total number of children
under school age is 17,784. The cost of feeding the necessitous
mothers and children amongst this total of 22,050
would be proportional to the cost of feeding necessitous
school children. In 1911, only dinners were provided to
necessitous school children on five days a week, but now
the Education Committee propose to give three meals a day
on seven days. If the same practice is adopted in respect
of expectant mothers and children under five years of age,
the estimated cost of feeding them will become 5,598 per
annum.
Schools for Mothers.
The foregoing resume of the conditions affecting maternity
and child welfare indicates especially the importance of
the training of mothers, and the greatest educational value
should be obtained out of the clinics and institutions which
it is proposed should be established.
Mothers should not only receive individual instruction
in how to take care of their baby when the baby is ill, but
should receive such instruction individually and collectively
prior to and after the birth of the infant.