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11
Trading Restriction) Act, 1936, and new regulations and
orders continue to flow from Parliament to the local
government officer. We had too, placed upon us, without
our seeking or advice, the responsibility of controlling
casualties in Air Raid Precaution schemes — an entirely
new and unwelcome service for local government officers.
From the viewpoint of the local health services the
year 1937 will remain noteworthy in that we began the
Municipal Midwifery Service. This long existing gap in
our services has now been filled, and in the years ahead I
hope to be able to show that the safe-guarding of motherhood,
and the prevention of stillbirths and premature
births will result from the merging of this service into the
general health services of the Borough. We failed, however,
to obtain the sanction of the Ministry of Health to
provide a doctor at the confinement, except in the case of
an emergency when he would he called in by the midwife.
It is hoped that legislation will eventually come so that
we can incorporate into all maternity schemes a medical
practitioner service for the confinement, apart from its
emergency provision.
In spite of all these new services, we have not left
undone what might be called the fundamentals of a Public
Health Service. Progress was made with the abolition of
cesspools, and of 360 cesspools that existed in the Borough
with the extension of our area to include Hayes and
Keston, 109 now remain. Until the whole area is sewered
and cesspools abolished we cannot be satisfied that the
environment is a safe one. Gross overcrowding in houses
is rapidly disappearing, but there has been a slowing up
in the building of new houses.
The results of our work are not always apparent, but
that improvement in public health practice does occur can
be demonstrated even in small matters. Some fourteen
years ago I took steps to discourage the dip-can method of
milk distribution, and to encourage the distribution of
bottled pasteurised milk from the place of production.
This method of distribution is now for all practical
purposes universal in Bromley—this is progress, but not
finality. The misuse of bottles by the public and the carelessness
in collection by the distributors has led to a state
of' affairs which is by no means satisfactory. The remedy