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4D
The recommendation of the Commission, however, was
justified by the experience of 1887, when the requirements of
an epidemic of scarlet fever obliged the Managers to re-open
the hospitals that had been closed, exhausted the accommodation
at all of the Town hospitals, compelled them to hire the Plaistow
Hospital at West Ham, and to open the new Northern Convalescent
Hospital at Winchmore Hill: it also necessitated the
erection of temporary huts at the Eastern, the South-Eastern,
and the South-Western Hospitals, and at the Northern Hospital,
where at one time upwards of 700 patients were accommodated.
In all, some 2700 beds were provided by the Managers, the maximum
number of patients at anyone time being 2611. What happened
in 1887 may happen again, for the very satisfactory reason
that the Managers' Hospitals have attained a popularity certain
to lead to increased use of them in the future by people in need
of isolation; the fact being that the strain in 1887 was due in no
slight degree to the larger proportion of the sick removed to
hospital as compared with previous years. Evidence of this fact
is furnished, as regards our own Parish, by the figures set out in
the Table at page 21. The experience of 1887 accentuates the
necessity for additional accommodation as recommended by the
Commission, and the matter should be taken in hand without
delay, it being probable that in the event of a severe epidemic the
demands on the hospitals would be more pressing than ever, as a
result of the passing of the Infectious Disease (Notification) Act,
1889. Few cases probably would escape notification, and the
more cases notified the greater would be the number of sick
persons requiring isolation in hospital.
WESTERN FEVER HOSPITAL, FULHAM.
In 1888 the Asylums Board had under consideration a
memorandum prepared by the Committee for the Western
Hospital, respecting the necessity of providing further accommodation
for fever patients at that Hospital—a course which