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52
own dear-bought experience, will not be questioned. The Board
last year opened a new hospital at Winchmore Hill, and were at
once threatened with legal proceedings in the event of acute
cases being sent thereto! I shall conclude these observations
with an extract from my report dated 10th January, 1877, only
premising that the views I then expressed—not for the first time
—are now generally accepted, and have, with so many other of
my recommendations, since received the sanction of the high
authority of the Hospitals Commission in their "Practical
Recommendations" (1882). "The work" (of hospital provision,
I wrote) "can be done more cheaply, more speedily, and more
efficiently by one Central Board than by numerous Local
Sanitary Authorities. The hospitals once built, moreover, and
a skeleton staff of doctors, nurses, and other officers provided, we
should be prepared for any epidemic, and should be spared the
periodical recurrence of panics. On the. other hand, if Vestries
and District Boards provide local hospitals, not only will the first
outlay be great, but each hospital will require a staff of officers,
got together with much expense, and with difficulty, only to be
scattered at the close of the epidemic—and probably, after all,
the hospitals will not be wanted, unless the beds in the Poor Law
Hospitals should remain untenanted !"
Much more might have been said on the subject, but it is unnecessary,
for whatever theoretical objections may be made to the
hospital system as it is worked (and we know that it is not
worked altogether in accordance with the letter of the law), there
can be no doubt that the public interests are studied in practice
to the highest degree, and that in an informal way a machinery
for dealing with infectious disease has been brought into operation
in this Metropolis, which is at once honourable to those
responsible for its creation, advantageous to the people, and the
admiration of foreign nations.
HOSPITAL ACCOMMODATION FOR "NON-PAUPERS."
In several of my monthly reports, within the last three
years, I have had occasion to refer to the proceedings of the