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5
Systematic Sanitary Visitation.
The importance of ascertaining as early as possible the scats of
epidemic and other diseases, and especially amongst the poor, in
any district, cannot be too much insisted upon; inasmuch as
without a reference of this kind no Medical Officer of Health
can act efficiently; but by means of returns of diseases,
in which the address is noted in cases of zymotic forms of
disease, and with data furnished to him from the Office of the
Registrar General, the Medical Officer of Health has a sure
basis for the Sanitary inspection of his district. A record, therefore,
is now kept of streets, houses, and even rooms infested with
the zymotic and spreading diseases.
The various Sanitary defects of a locality already suspected
are at once discoverable, and orders can be issued for their
removal. The Sanitary records of the office have now in detail
the following particulars respecting certain streets and houses
where death and disease have visited :—Owner or occupier—the
number of adults—of children—of holdings—of rooms and
the cubic space—means of ventilation—state of premises,
water-closets, drains, dust-receptacle, water-supply, &c. The
Inspectors are invariably well received, and are thanked for any
instructions in Sanitary arrangements and improvements
There seems no just reason why these visits should be confined to
dwellings of the lower ranks of persons, or that the mansions
of the rich should escape inspection.
Sec. 35, or Over-crowding Clauses of Sanitary Act.
The importance of carrying out this plan of systematic
Sanitary inspection is evident, inasmuch as, to a great extent, it
obviates the necessity for putting in force the 35th Section of
the Sanitary Act, which, it will be remembered, the Vestry
decided in the negative last June. Those important clauses
relative to over-crowding in towns containing above 5,000
inhabitants, are therefore not in operation in Paddington.
The working of this part of the Sanitary Act is watched
with great interest. We may safely predict that in many
parishes where it is adopted it will be found not only impracticable,
but must inflict additional hardship and inconvenience
upon some of the very poor, if they be displaced before better
kind of accommodation is provided for them. They will simply
be removed from their present wretched abodes to others very
little if at all better, and the thousands that have to be turned
out of home in one parish must take refuge and make more
intolerable the worst places in a neighbouring one. A subject
therefore of primary importance to all local Authorities is the
amelioration of the dwellings of the poor by new constructions,
before the demolition of those pronounced unfit for human
habitations.