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equally a place in which food hygiene is beyond reproach. But
as I have already said, until we can be assured of the fullest
co-operation from every burgess in the district,this happy state
of affairs will still remain beyond our reach.
My remarks this year on health education have been incorporated
in Appendix 1, at the end of this Report.
It has been very rightly said that a Medical Officer of Health
must concern himself with every known factor in his Area which
may affect the health of the community. For this reason the
Public Health Department has been intimately connected with
campaigns to promote clean food to control the spread of infectious
diseases, to remedy housing defects, indeed all matters which come
within the purview of environmental hygiene. As will also be
known, we have associated ourselves with the prevention of accidents
in the home, a very urgent and increasing problem, with
health education, a function which we share with the Middlesex
County Council, and have also keenly watched the very rapid progress
made in the field of vaccination and immunisation. But
there is one other health hazard which has recently been given
considerable prominence and in which the Public Health Department
must of necessity be interested. I refer to radiation.
Radiation, in other words, the hazards which can arise from
the use or disposal of radio-active substances, has presented a
problem not only in this country but throughout the civilised
world. It has been said that the hazards associated with radioactive
substances are not nearly so great as those associated
either with accidents on the road or accidents in the home. While
this may well be true there is a vast difference between accidents
which occur on the road or in the home and accidents or even
fatalities due to radiation. We can all see the disastrous
results of careless driving, burns, scalds or falls in the home:
but radiation still remains a vast complicated and somehow terrifying
subject which yet remains beyond the understanding of many,
even highly intelligent people. When a child pulls a kettle of
water on himself and is scalded we can see the unhappy result:
when someone is knocked down by a car, the result is again only
too obvious. But the effect of gamma or beta rays or even electrons
on our body may not be known for a very long period. We cannot
see these rays we cannot smell them, we do not know that they are
in the vicinity. Yet we are told that they are highly dangerous
either to ourselves or to our progeny. Is it therefore any wonder
that the general public are becoming alarmed, are asking to know
the full facts and are demanding adequate protection?
I have attended a number of conferences which discussed this
intriguing subject. On the whole these conferences have produced
statements to the effect that the Central Government has the
matter well under control, that the public need have no fear,
and that adequate steps would be taken if the permissible limits
of radio-activity were ever passed,' One has no reason to doubt
these statements, or to doubt that the government has set up an
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