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37
cated with the managers of the Asylums Board, who gave effect
to the excellent suggestion by Sir E. H. Currie, to utilise the
Darenth site for a convalescent hospital. The hospital was
opened on the 11th May ; as many as 600 patients were provided
for in it at one time, and some 2,400 cases in all; the
result being that the " hospital difficulty " was at an end, so far
as the sufficiency of accommodation at the disposal of the managers
was concerned. The experiment was so successful, indeed,
that it is no matter for surprise that the ('ommissioners should
have made the establishment of country hospitals for mild and
convalescent cases of small-pox (and of fever also), the central
feature in their " recommendations," justly recognising it as
the practical solution of the difficulty.
But to resume:—Your Yestry having steadfastly opposed every
proposition to establish numerous local or district hospitals for
infectious diseases, it is satisfactory to observe that the Commissioners
(par. 16) are equally opposed to the multiplication of
such establishments for reasons which closely correspond with
your Vestry's objections, as set out in my fifteenth report for
the year 1876, and repeated in my report on " Hospital Accommodation."
The principle of "free hospital treatment" is strongly recommended—("
It is desirable in the public interest to attract to
these hospitals, even by the bribe of gratuitous treatment, all
who will go thither." Report, page xii.)—and provision of
separate wards at the several Hospitals for those who are able
and willing to pay for special accommodation, as was proposed
in my report above mentioned.
The Commissioners would greatly reduce the number of smallpox
cases to be treated at any one centre in London, but they
have recommended provision of a limited number of beds (30 or
40) for small-pox at each of the Fever Hospitals, a plan to
which I made favourable reference in my " Abstract of Evidence."
( Vide Annual Report for 1881, page 52.)
But I thought, and am still of opinion, that more beds for
acute cases of small-pox might safely be set apart at each