Hints from the Health Department. Leaflet from the archive of the Society of Medical Officers of Health. Credit: Wellcome Collection, London
[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for Kensington]
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pox patients, "can only be used for fever when there is little or no
small-pox in London, and on that account only, ought not to be relied
on at all"—apart from the inconvenience resulting from its great
distance from the Acute Hospitals. "The erection of temporary huts,
and the strain caused to the resources of the existing hospitals by the
additional patients, are attended with so many serious inconveniences,
that huts ought to be adopted only as a last resort." The sub-committee
hoped, at an early date, to "submit a site for a second Acute
Hospital, and a site for a Convalescent Hospital, in the South of
London." Meanwhile, with reference to the sanction given by the
Local Government Board to the erection of temporary huts, "on the
understanding that such erections are removed on the cessation of the
epidemic; "and, "while fully recognizing the undesirability of such
huts, unless absolutely necessary," they are of opinion that it would
be unwise to pull them down until the proposed new permanent accommodation
is ready; and they therefore recommended that the Local
Government Board be requested to allow the huts to remain, pending
the provision of such permanent accommodation, not necessarily for
use, but ready to be used in case an emergency, similar to that of the
past year, should again arise."
The Recommendations of the sub-committee were as
follows:—
(a) That, subject to the approval of the Local Government
Board, the Tooting Lodge Estate be purchased
as a site for a Fever Hospital at the
sum of £28,000.
(b) That the Local Government Board be forthwith
requested to assent to the permanent appropriation
of the site of the North-Eastern Hospital
at Tottenham to the purposes of a Fever Hospital;
and
(c) That the Local Government Board be requested to
allow the temporary structures which have been
erected during the past year, at the various
Hospitals, to remain standing until sufficient
permanent accommodation is actually ready."