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81
ADDENDUM.
HOSPITAL TREATMENT OF INFECTIOUS DISEASES.
At page 25 (ante) I referred to a promise made by the President of the
Local Government Board to a Deputation, consisting of delegates from
London Vestries and District Boards of Works, represented by Mr.
Lindsay as their spokesman, to deal with the subject of hospital treatment
of infectious diseases in a "Poor Law Amendment Bill" during the then
current session. Mr. Sclater Booth has redeemed this promise, and by
an Act* passed on the last day of the session the Metropolitan Asylums
Board are now enabled, with the approval of the Local Government
Board, to contract with any Vestry, &c., in the Metropolis (as the
"local authority" acting in the execution of the Nuisances Removal
Act, 1855, &c.) for the reception and maintenance in the hospitals
of the Managers of any person suffering from any dangerous infectious
disorder within the district of any such Vestry, &c.; and any person
received into an hospital by virtue of any such contract, under the
15th section of the Act, will be deemed to be maintained in such hospital
by the Vestry, &c., with whom the contract is made. It is further
enacted that any expenses incurred by the Vestry, &c. (local authority),
for the maintenance of any person under this section shall be deemed
to be due from such person to the local authority, and may be recovered
by the local authority from him or his representatives at any time
within six months after his discharge from such hospital.
The powers thus given to the sanitary authority to contract for the
maintenance in hospitals of non-paupers, is a round-about way of depauperising
the relief afforded to such persons in the, hospitals belong,
ing to the Managers, which are essentially pauper establishments. The
power given to the sanitary authority to recover from the sick person or
his representatives the expenses incident to his treatment in the hospital
may possibly be found useful in occasional instances ; but, put plainly,
it amounts to this—that the sanitary authority, having for the protection
of the public health, succeeded in getting a person to consent to be
isolated in a pauper estab ishment, side by side with paupers, may upon
his discharge therefrom, or on his death occurring, proceed to recover
from him or his representatives the costs incurred by them—on his
account doubtless, but for the protection of the public rather than for
the safety of the patient himself. If this power should be at all generally
exercised by the Vestries, &c., it would more than neutralise any
benefit likely to accrue from (he discretion they now have to contract
with the Managers for the reception and maintenance of non-paupers.
It is therefore to be hoped that in any district where such power is
* The short title of the Act is " The Poor Law Act, 1879."