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51
Tuberculosis Dispensaries than was possible whilst the Care Committee's
offices were so far distant from the Dispensaries.
It was eventually arranged that the Hackney and Stoke Newington
Tuberculosis Care Committee should be accommodated within
the Dispensary premises at the Metropolitan Hospital and serve only
that part of Hackney together with the Borough of Stoke Newington
which that Dispensary covers and to constitute a new Care Committee
to be accommodated within the London Chest Hospital
Tuberculosis Dispensary to serve the remainder of Hackney and
the Borough of Bethnal Green.
The two Care Committees are operating very successfully and
with considerable advantage to the patients and their families who
can now see within the same premises both Tuberculosis Officer and
Care Committee Secretary.
In the place of the Handicrafts Class formerly held in the Lower
Clapton Road offices of the Care Committee, a Class is now held each
week at each of the two Dispensaries and good attendances are
maintained at both Classes.
SCABIES AND VERMINOUS CONDITIONS.
The cases of scabies notified during 1946 and the number
requiring treatment at the Cleansing Station both show a continued
decline as compared with recent years:—
1944 1945 1946
Cases notified 1,032 1,021 924
Cases treated at Cleansing Station 2,825 2,611 2,059
The number of adults and children under school age requiring
cleansing from head or body lice also shows an improvement, but
there was a considerable increase in the number of schoolchildren
deloused during the year. It must be remembered in this conneciton
that the child population of the Borough was much larger in
1946 than during the war years owing to the return of children from
their war-time homes in the provinces, and the number of cleansings
required by schoolchildren during the year was almost exactly equal
to the 1938 figure.
It is hoped that the advice on this subject given by the Health
Visitors as a routine during their visits to homes and at the Clinics,
coupled with the efforts of the school medical service and others,
will reduce the amount of verminous infestation, but progress in this
direction is undoubtedly retarded by the housing difficulties and '
overcrowding which have resulted from the war.