View report page

46
ever, felt that they had no legal power to admit cases of Measles
upon the application of Poor Law Authorities. The Chairman
nevertheless holds that the question of the isolation of Measles
is one which can hardly be indefinitely delayed, as the disease
has increased in extent and virulence during the past few years.
He considers, moreover, that equal precautions should be adopted
whether deaths are occasioned by Small-pox, Fever, Diphtheria,
or Measles, it being the paramount duty of a Sanitary Authority
to prevent death from preventible causes. (It is probable,
however, for reasons that I have elsewhere set out, that admission
to the hospitals of sufferers from Measles would not have
the same effect in controlling an epidemic as in the case of an
epidemic of Scarlet Fever or Small-pox.) Only 62 cases of
Small-pox were admitted during the year, two at the Eastern
Hospital, and the rest on board the Hospital Ships at Long
Reach. These eases, and indeed all cases of infectious disease
received by the Managers, were notified without loss of time to
the Medical Officers of Health of the districts whence the
patients came. In June the Managers accepted a tender for
the construction of a permanent hospital for convalescing
Small-pox patients at Darenth, which will accommodate 600
patients, in addition to 200 patients for whom infirmary accommodation
has been made by the removal and consolidation, at
the site of Camp No. 2, of the wooden buildings which constituted
the Camps 1 and 2 during the last epidemic. Provisiou
is to be made for a few Small-pox patients at the Western
Hospital. The legal position of the Managers in regard to
the admission into the hospitals of patients is described as
" anomalous and unsatisfactory." The Local Government
Board sanctions the expenditure incurred in the treatment of
non-pauper patients, admitted on the certificates of Sanitary
Officers and private Medical Practitioners, without the intervention
of the Relieving Officer, but the President of the Local
Government Board has not been able to carry out his intention
to propose legislation for the purpose of removing any
doubt as to the legality of expenditure of this character.