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"not in a position to undertake the removal of any cases of
infectious disease beyond those which are to be received into
hospitals under their own control." Commenting on this reply
in my Annual Report for 1884, I ventured to express a conviction
that the Managers would, in course of time, recognize the
desirableness of giving effect to my views. That time has
arrived, the Managers having, in 1888, stated their opinion
"that the conveyance of infectious cases by public vehicles
should be prohibited by law," and expressed willingness to "use
the machinery they possess for the prompt and economical
removal of infectious cases." They doubted their " power to
use their Ambulances for other cases than those contemplated
by the Poor Law Act of 1879," but were ready "to co-operate
with the Commissioner of Police with the view of obtaining for
the Board the power to undertake the general removal of
infectious cases in the metropolis." The Police Authorities had
communicated with the Board (as well as with the Sanitary
Authorities) with a view to the disinfection of cabs that had been
used for the conveyance of infectious cases. The views of the
Managers were communicated to the Local Government Board,
and it cannot be doubted that ere long the Managers will be the
Ambulance Authority, as well as the Infectious Hospital
Authority, for all London.
SMALL-POX HOSPITAL ACCOMMODATION.
The Royal Commission (of 1882), in one of their "practical
recommendations," proposed that provision should be made of
sites and buildings which could without difficulty be made capable
of receiving 2,100, or by special exertion, 2,700, small-pox
patients. The actual accommodation falls very far below the
smaller of these totals, consisting as it does of some 350 beds
at the Hospital Ships, and 60 beds, in all, at the three London
Hospitals, to which Ambulance Stations are attached (beds for
exceptional patients, and which the Asylums Board will not
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