The State Board of Health and a quarter century of public-health work in Michigan / by Theo. R. MacClure.

  • MacClure (Theodore R.). 1869-
Date:
[1898]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The State Board of Health and a quarter century of public-health work in Michigan / by Theo. R. MacClure. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    meeting to appoint a health officer ancl immediately report to the State Board the name and postoffice address of the health officer. .In changing these laws there came a question of just who should appoint the health officer; some thought the central board should appoint that official; but. partly through the influence of Hon. Witter J. Baxter, the principle of local self government was made to prevail, the health officer to be appointed by the local board, and the local board to have absolute jurisdiction over health matters in its township, city or village. The local board is the medium of communication, of the people with the State Board, and the State Board with the people. There was a statutory provision that householders and physicians should report small-pox and other “diseases dangerous to the public health” to the board of health or to the health officer. The law was changed to read that the reports should lie made to the president or clerk of the board of health or to the health officer. This still left it quite indefinite and uncertain about the reception of the reports; and, in 1895, the law was changed to have such reports “made immediately to the health officer”, and to the health officer only. The principal duty imposed upon the local board of health, at the time the State Board was established, was in connection with nuisances, it being then believed that most of the dangerous diseases were most frequently spread by tilth. With some few exceptions these laws have remained the same; but the duties of local health officers have been very greatly changed. By reason of this organization, in place of Inactive boards with no health officer, there are active boards of health with active health officers, with certain specified duties to perform, which relate more directly to the actual restriction and pre- vention of diseases. By-Laws of the Michigan State Board of health. ARTICLE I.—Meetings of the Board. Section 1. The regular meetings of the Board shall be held at Lansing, in the Capitol, on the second Fridays of January, April, July, and October in each year, at 10:30 A. M.; and the meeting iu April shall be the annual meeting. [As amended Oct. 8, 1878, Oct. 11, 1892, June 15. 1894.] Sec. 2. Special meetings of the Board may be called at any time and place by the President. The President shall also call special meetings of the Board on the written request of a majority of the members of the Board, by giving a proper and sufficient notice of the time, place, and object of the meeting to all the mem- bers of the Board. ARTICLE II.—Officers of. Section 1. The President of the Board shall hold his office for two years, and until a successor is elected. The election shall take place at the annual meeting •of the Board in each alternate year, beginning with 1875. Sec. 2. In the absence of the President, a President jiro tent, mav be chosen by the members present at any meeting of the Board.