View report page

21
generally, it may be observed that different qualities must be
connoted with notifications from different sources. Medical
opinion, on some matters, is at present in a state of flux, and
while circumstances may sometimes require the notification of a
case as diphtheria on grounds bacteriological rather than
clinical, yet at other times notification may be called for rather
by the obvious need for isolation than the ascertained presence
of a specific organism. Naturally the former set of circumstances
obtains most frequently amongst the upper classes, and
the latter amongst the lower.
With regard to vaccination, it may be said that the
District Council, at the beginning of the present outbreak of
Small Pox, took every possible step to promote the adoption of
this necessary means of protection, and it is largely to the great
measure of success that has followed these steps that 1 attribute
the immunity of the district during 1901.
The Richmond Guardians were officially communicated
with, and they courteously and promptly acceded to a request
that they would promulgate notices of the need and opportunities
for re-vaccination.
The School Board for Barnes, and the Managers
of the National Schools at Mortlake, also responded to
communications made to them by taking steps to promote,
with all due deference to parental authority, vaccination and
re-vaccination amongst their scholars. The general public have
also submitted in great numbers to re-vaccination at the hands
of private and public vaccinators.
I am unable to publish this year, as my predecessor did in
times past, any statistics of value in respect of infant vaccination,
for, under the new Act vaccination is so generally postponed
until the sixth month that any tabulated return would shew