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28
These plans are being rapidly carried into effect under
Mr. Tomes' superintendence, and will, with the addition of the very
efficient system of electric lighting and telephonic communication
devised by Mr. Davidson, add very materially to the efficiency of
the Hospital.
As Medical Officer of Health, I cannot of course but
regret that financial considerations should have led to the postponement
of the typhoid pavilion being built; but the necessity for such
a block has been recognized, and I am confident that the Council
will, at the earliest possible moment, take steps to realize a project
the necessity of which, before very long, will be patent to every
ratepayer. The district is growing rapidly ; many hundreds of flats
and tenements and small dwellings are imminent, and the difficulty
of securing the admission of typhoid patients to general hospitals
is, every summer, becoming greater.
Hospital provision for infectious disease should be anticipatory;
like a fire brigade, an isolation hospital is a safeguard; it is
most useful when least used. No one would say that expenditure
on an efficient fire brigade is wasteful when, in the district served
by it, dangerous or fatal fires do net occur.
Yet many think that an isolation hospital is extravagant
unless it is full, or in other words, unless it is failing to perform its
function—the prevention of disease.
The necessary expenditure on what is called maintenance,
and which includes the payment of rates, water rates, insurance and
other inevitable charges, cannot, in small isolation hospitals, vary
much with the number of patients under treatment.
This is so because the expense of maintenance (after payment
of rates, insurance premiums and other recurring charges),
depends chiefly on the number of wards in use.