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is of course very rare above that age—so a very rough calculation would
mean that about one-third of all children from birth to 10 years had
measles during the last winter.
Welfare of the Aged.
This topic must take a foremost place in the work of every Health
Department and there need be no excuse for mentioning it again in this
year's preface.
Here I would like to draw attention to the excellent work of the
Housing Committee in providing accommodation for old people. Accommodation
for approximately 86 single old people and 44 married couples has
already been provided and a new venture is at present under construction—
Stoneleigh Court—where accommodation is to be provided for a further
group of old people, who, in addition, suffer from some physical handicap.
The Public Health Department will be made responsible for selecting the
people to occupy these flats and it is hoped that by the time this Annual
Report is published, the selection will have been completed.
In this connection I would also like to mention the venture at present
being considered for the employment of the aged, where the initiative
belonged to Toc H.
Many people have complained of the division of the National Health
Service into three parts—hospitals, general practitioners and local authorities—each
of which is concerned with the welfare of old people and often
working independently of each other. There is actually, of course, a fourth
part, the voluntary services. We are fortunate in this town in having a
Committee run by a section of the fourth part, the Ilford Social Service
Association, which concerns itself with the welfare of the aged. On this
Committee, are Mrs. East of the I.S.S.A. (as Secretary), representatives of
the Borough Council, Ilford and Barking Group Hospital Management
Committee, National Assistance Board, local general practitioners, Essex
Welfare Committee, voluntary societies, the old people themselves, and
myself as Chairman. This Committee has met regularly for some years,
and is doing excellent work. It has one main defect, however; there is no
representative on it of any hospital that caters mainly for the aged and
chronic sick, for the simple reason that these hospitals are not in Ilford
and do not really feel that we are part of their catchment area. The 22
beds for women under the control of the Ilford and Barking Group
Hospital Management Committee are of course quite inadequate for the
local demand
I have heard the Minister of Health state that it was often said that
the strange thing about the National Health Service is that while
theoretically it should not work, nevertheless, in practice it does. May I
suggest here that the reason why it does work is that local people, who
know local needs, and feel strongly on the matter, join together to patch
up its defects, by arrangements that do not appear in the National Health
Service Act, 1946. Examples of this are the many services that are subsidised
by the Metropolitan Boroughs, for instance Chiropody Services, employment
of welfare workers for the aged and sheltered employment for them.
This Ilford Committee that I have mentioned is but another example.
Health Visitors.
After some troubled years, the Health Visiting section now appears to
be settling down, with numbers more adequate and personnel more contented.
We have tried to increase their possibilities of co-operation with other
medical and social workers in the town and have had our second annual
meeting between the health visitors and the general practitioners, which
was as successful as the first. A great disadvantage of this type of meeting
with the doctors, however, is that we repeatedly meet the more interested
members of the medical profession at such "get-togethers," but never
seem to see a large number who do not feel the need for such co-operation,