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Samples of water were taken from both baths. The results
of the tests were uniformly satisfactory.
There is nothing I can add to the remarks which I have made
in previous Annual Reports relating to the use of our Swimming
Baths. This was especially noticeable last summer, when full
advantage was taken of the excellent weather. During the summer
months, Durnsford Road Swimming Bath not only proved itself a
first-class amenity, but what is even more important, showed
itself to be a means of providing health-giving exercise; in the
open air.
One matter which has been exercising me, particularly as
District School Medical Officer has been the increasing incidence
of plantar warts (verrucas) among schoolchildren. Although it
is quite obvious that swimming baths are by no means the only way
in which verrucas can be spread, it is equally obvious that the
wet surrounds of swimming baths, either open-air or closed, provide
an excellent means of allowing the virus which causes verrucas to
pass from one child to another. In order to try to obviate this
particular means of spreading verrucas. I addressed the letter
set out below to the Superintendent of our swimming baths:-
"I have been worried for some considerable time about the
matter of the exclusion of children from the Swimming Baths
who are a danger to other children - and even to adults - by
reason of the spread of infectious diseases. I am thinking
particularly of that great nuisance, the plantar wart or, as
it is usually known,the verruca, even when the wart is covered
by adhesive plaster. As we are all aware, adhesive plaster
has a nasty habit of coming off in water.
"We know that these warts can be and are being spread to
quite an extent on swimming bath surrounds. The reason is
very simple. Swimming bath surrounds are one of the few places
where large numbers of children persistently walk for fairly
long periods with bare feet, If a child with a verruca walks
on a swimming bath surround with bare feet, the virus which
causes a verruca can be left behind on the surround and may
be picked up by any child who follows shortly afterwards. As
you will see, it is not the swimming bath itself which has
anything whatsoever to do with the spread of verrucas; it is
simply and solely the fact that children do use the surrounds
in bare feet.
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