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Public Health Department,
Town Hall, Wallington.
To the Worshipful the Mayor, Aldermen and Councillors of the Borough
of Beddington and Wallington.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
I beg to present ray annual report for 1948, this being the twelfth I
have presented, and, as a result of the coming into operation of the
National Health Service Act, 1946, the last of the series of reports in
which maternity and child welfare is dealt with. On the 5th July, 1948,
the following services were transferred to the Surrey County Council :—
Care of Mothers and Young Children ;
Health Visiting ;
Home Nursing ;
Vaccination and Immunisation ;
Ambulance Services ;
Prevention of Illness, Care and After-care ; and
Domestic Help.
In order to give a more completely comparative picture of the health
of the population, it was thought better to include all statistical information
for the whole period of the twelve months of 1948. Future reports,
however, will no longer contain statistical information relating to the
transferred services. This will be submitted to the County Council as
the local Health Authority under the Act.
The year will be memorable as one of the great landmarks in the
history of Public Health and Social Medicine, the importance of this
new legislation being comparable with the introduction of the Public
Health Act of 1875, and the Local Government Act of 1929. Many years will
elapse before the full effects of the introduction of the Act can be estimated.
As was foreshadowed in the report for 1947, the Borough forms, with
Carshalton, the Mid-Eastern Division of the County Health Scheme, the
Medical Officer of Health sharing with the Medical Officer of Health
for the Urban District of Carshalton the administrative responsibility as
Divisional Medical Officer. The transfer was effected very smoothly and
efficiently, the inhabitants of the Borough enjoying the health services
run on similar lines to those which obtained prior to the coming into
operation of the Act. It will probably be some time before any major
scheme of expansion or improvement can be contemplated.
The report is drawn up in accordance with the suggestions made by
the Minister of Health in his Circular 3/49. The vital statistics are based
on information supplied by the Registrar-General ; this was received in
mid-May, 1949.
The Registrar-General's estimate of the population of the Borough
at the middle of the year is 32,800, but from information available from
local sources (e.g., the Food Control Office) the population at the end of
1948 was 34,902.
The birth rate per 1,000 total population shows a further decrease at
14.57 in 1948, as compared with 16.91 in 1947, and is below that for
England and Wales, which is 17.9. The stillbirth rate of 0.46 per 1,000
total population is lower than the figure of 0.49 for 1947, and compares
favourably with that for England and Wales, which is 0.42. The stillbirth
rate per 1,000 total births is 30.43 compared with 28.37 in 1947.
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