View report page

139
upon school children, to try to prevent them acquiring the habit.
Tiiis is being done constantly by all medical officers during their
routine medical inspections which are performed in the schools.
So far as I am concerned, in addition to education during the
routine medical inspections, I am carrying out a controlled experiment
in two Ilford schools lasting over a period of five years. This
experiment consists mainly of lectures to children. At the end of
five years the effect of these lectures will be assessed and we shall
be in a better position to know whether health education among
school children is likely to reduce the number of cigarette addicts
in the future."
Smoking and Lung Cancer
Dr. D. J. Gordon-Smith reports as follows:—
"There was a satisfactory response to the offer of short
courses in schools on health education, and a number of schools
have been visited on more than one occasion. All the girls at Dane
S.M. School were given a talk on smoking and lung cancer and most
of the senior boys at Becontree S.M., Ilford County High, Fairlop
S.M., and the senior girls at the Mount and Gearies S.M. have had
talks. Health Visitors have been involved in school teaching in
many other schools. This is by far the most encouraging and
certainly most rewarding aspect of health education in the borough
and again it is hoped that this will expand in coming years. A
particularly successful venture was a free discussion group held
with some of the senior girls at Fairlop S.M. A recently married
teacher gave her impressions of the adaptations necessary for a
successful marriage, and from there, discussion ranged over most
of the problems of contemporary society and how young people can
deal with them. This is health education at its best, and probably
no amount of talk on health and hygiene will be as useful and
acceptable to young people as a free discussion on parent/child
relationships or the adjustments needed when leaving school.
Young people are not, on average, particularly interested in
smokeless zones or the problems of ageing. But they are engrossed
with aspects of human relationships with their parents, with their
peers, with teachers and other adults. The attention of the more
senior girl can be riveted by discussions on personal hygiene and
make-up, elementary child psychology and infant care. Senior boys
are absorbed in discussions on relationships with persons in