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68
been repealed by the Public Health Act. The notifications in Kensington
were 788, equal to nearly 3 per cent, on the total number,
the population of the Parish to that of London, as a whole, being
equal to nearly 4 per cent.
The Committee cite the views of some of the Medical Superintendents
of the Hospitals, regarding the advantages to the public
health which might be expected to ensue from the uniform application
of the best devised methods of quarantine, or isolation, and disinfection
; and express their opinion that "there is a great need for certain
practicable alterations in the present arrangements for applying
preventive measures." Small-pox is the disease the Committee have
especially in view. It is the duty of the Sanitary Authority, upon
report of a case, to disinfect: whilst the Board of Guardians may set
in motion the Vaccination Officer and the Public Vaccinator. The
Committee agree with the Chairman of the Board, and with
the Ambulance Committee, as elsewhere set out, that it would be to
the public advantage were the Managers empowered to vaccinate or
re-vaccinate the inmates of infected houses, and to disinfect after all
cases of infectious disease. Many cases, however, do not go to
hospital, and come to the knowledge of the Board only at the commencement
of the illness, upon receipt of a copy of the certificate of
notification forwarded by the Medical Officer of Health. The Committee,
however, recommend that:—
"The Managers do petition the Legislature to take at an early date, in the
interests of public health, such measures as will place entirely in the
hands of a central body, powers, not only of isolating the sick, but of
following the ambulance with the means of immediately disinfecting the
premises, bedding, &c., from which the infected persons have been
removed ; of vaccinating or re-vaccinating those who may have been in
contact with the infected person or things and of compensating,
when necessary, persons detained in quarantine in the interests of public
health. Only by these means," the Committee believe, "will the
Metropolis be saved from the occurrence of a widespread epidemic of
small-pox, which the persistent attacks of this most preventible disease
constantly threaten."
The Committee refer to a "hardship," to which, during the last
twenty years, I have on several occasions directed attention, "inflicted
on persons who have small-pox so slightly, that during their stay in