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held at the latter end of 1880, the Corporation adopted the
following resolution, viz.:—
"That the Council strongly approve of the principle of the notification to
"the sanitary authority of the existence of dangerous infectious disease,
"and consider such notification most necessary in this city. That the
"Lord Mayor, and such members as think fit to accompany him, do
"seek an interview with the Chief Secretary, to request him to introduce
"a permissive Bill for the purpose, applicable to all Ireland, or to give
"the support of the Government to such a Bill, if introduced by the
"Lord Mayor and other members. That it be referred to a committee
"of the whole House to prepare suggestions to lay before the Chief
"Secretary as to the mode of carrying out the proposal, with power to
"consult with the gentlemen of the medical profession who waited on
"the Lord Mayor, with a view to joint action, and, if considered desi"rable,
a joint deputation."
In the result a Bill was introduced into the House of Commons
during the current session, but whether it can be carried through,
in the present state of public business, is doubtful.
Several English towns and boroughs have Local Bills for
the same purposes, now under the consideration of the legislature.
The Vestry's action in the matter.—Having called attention
to the above important question in my 12th and 13th reports
for 1880, (Nov. 10th and Dec. 8th, page 73 and page 82,) your
Vestry resolved to take it into special consideration at the meeting
to be held on Dec. 22nd: I thereupon lost no time in placing
myself in communication with the Medical Officers of Health of
the seventeen English towns and boroughs which had already
obtained local Acts (inter alia) for the compulsory notification of
infectious diseases, and I submitted a summary of the information
thus obtained, in a Special Report dated Dec. 22nd, (No. 14,
page 85). At the same time I drew attention to a defect in the
26th section of the Sanitary Act, 1866, which provides for the
removal to hospital, by justice's order, of infectious sick persons
who are "without proper lodging or accommodation," a defect which
has often defeated the object of the section, and baffled the efforts of
medical officers to get suitable cases removed to hospital, on the
ground that the lodging, etc., was sufficient for the accommodation,
although notoriously inadequate for the isolation, of the sick. It