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35
INFANT WELFARE CENTRES.
The following table shows the work done at the Infant Welfare
Centres during the year:
Total attendances at all Centres:
(1) By children under one year of age 38,665
(2) By children between the ages of one and five years 24,501
Total number of children who first attended at the Centres during
the year and who on the date of their first attendance were :
(1) Under one year of age 2,426
(2) Between the ages of one and five years 754
Total number of children under five years of age who attended at
the Centres during the year and who at the end of the year were :
(1) Under one year of age 2,064
(2) Over one year of age 6,015
Attendances: In May a report was submitted dealing with the
subject of the attendances at the infant welfare centres. Summarized,
it is that whereas just before the outbreak of the war the average weekly
attendance was just short of 1,900, soon after the re-opening of the clinic
sessions in September the average was 1,346. By April, 1940, the figure
had increased to 1,595, and by August to 1,664. The average for the
last few months of the year was 1,110, a figure which rose to 1,271 by
April, 1941. Rising to a maximum of 1,544 in September the figure
fell by the end of the year to 1,372. Many reasons account for the very
different figures now as compared with those preceding the war, one being
that mothers now go out to work. The fact that premises where sessions
are held had to be changed, together with other discomforts, including
the black-out in the winter months diminishes attendances. The evacuation
of some of the mothers with their children or some of the children
without their parents accounts for part of the difference, while, particularly
in one or two parts of the district, it is felt that the institution of
the arrangement for the issue of free milk without the necessity of the
applicants attending the clinics has had some effect in reducing the numbers
of those attending.
Vitamin preparations: In December arrangements were made by
the Ministry of Food for the free supply of vitamin preparations to children
under five years of age. In this district the distribution of most of these
preparations has been from the infant welfare centres.
TREATMENT.
The following particulars show the extent to which the facilities
for treatment are used.
Dental treatment : 280 children under five years of age and 389
expectant or nursing mothers made 1,009 attendances for
treatment.