London's Pulse: Medical Officer of Health reports 1848-1972

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City of London 1889

[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for Port of London]

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(d) The charge for the hire of the Ambulance, including (when the patient
is over ten years of age) the services of a male attendant, is 5s. This
amount must be paid to the Driver, who will give an official receipt for
the same.
(e) One person only will be allowed to accompany the patient, and such
person may be conveyed back to the place from which the patient was
conveyed.
(f) The Ambulances may be sent outside the Metropolitan district only by
special sanction of the Ambulance Committee or of the Clerk to the
Board, and in such cases an extra charge will be made of Is. for every
mile outside the Metropolitan area.
4. The Drivers of the Board's Ambulances are not allowed to loiter on their
journeys or to stop for refreshments on pain of instant dismissal. It is particularly
requested that any breach of this regulation, or any neglect or
incivility on the part of the Drivers, Nurses, or Attendants may be immediately
reported to the undersigned.
The Servants of the Board are forbidden to accept any gratuities or
refreshments.
(By Order), W. F. JEBB,
Clerk to the Board.
Dated 16th December, 1889.
Another important measure of the past Session is the Infectious Disease
(Notification) Act, 1889, which requires notification of every case of certain
diseases specified in the Act to be notified to the Medical Officer of Health,
both by the householder and the practitioner in attendance on the patient.
The Act came into force in every London District on 1st November, 1889,
and may be voluntarily adopted by any Sanitary Authority provided that a
resolution to this effect be passed at a meeting of such Authority, and
fourteen clear days at least before such meeting special notice of the meeting
and of the intention to propose such resolution shall be given to every
member of the Local Authority.
This resolution when passed shall also be published at least one month
before the Act comes into operation. Your Worshipful Committee has always
so keenly urged the compulsory notification of disease, and so strongly recommended
the extension of our imperfect regulations, that a resolution was at once
passed to recommend the Corporation, as the Port Sanitary Authority, to adopt
the Act, and this report is now before the Court of Common Council, the date
fixed being the first of March.
By this Act for the first time the master of every vessel will be compelled
to notify any case of infectious disease. Hitherto, as you are aware, a very
large number of craft, to wit: sailing barges trading wholly within the Port,
and which therefore can never be said to arrive within the Port, have been