[Report 1947] / Medical Officer of Health, Solihull County Borough.

  • Solihull (England). County Borough Council.
Date:
1947
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: [Report 1947] / Medical Officer of Health, Solihull County Borough. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    18/26 page 16
    126 infestations were discovered of which one was estimated to be a reservoir infestation, (i.e., over 200 rats), 25 of a major character (over 50 rats) and 100 of a minor nature. The number of premises concerned being 160. Owing to the essentially residential character of the district most of the infestations were found at private dwellings. In Sewers. Two investigations into the state of rat infestation of the Coun- ’ cil’s sewers were carried out during the financial year 1947-48, one of them in early 1948, but as this report deals with the calendar year 1947, these remarks are confined to the investigation undertaken between September and December 1947. A proportion of the foul sewer inspection chambers only were baited, sausage rusk being used for this purpose, and of 387 chambers so treated, in 115 cases it was shown that rats were present and in 27 cases complete consumtion of the bait was recorded. Those chambers showing the presence of rats were retreated with a mixture of sausage rusk and arsenic. INDUSTRIAL SMOKE ABATEMENT. Although informal observations were made of factory chimneys, the results wers negative, and no case calling for detailed investigation was discovered. SHOPS ACT, 1934. Due to limitation of stocks the need of enforcing early closing hours has been considerably reduced. Routine visits have been paid to enforce those provisions of the Acts dealing with sanitary provisions and comfort of workers. FACTORIES. During the war years pre-occupation in matters concerned with the prosecution of the war together with inadequacy of staffs resulted in records being neglected. Opportunity was taken during the year of making a complete survey of factories in the area and 174 factories were found, re-inspected and recorded. Th niimbm of cases in which defects were found was as follows :— Overcrowding ... ... ... ... 2 Sanitary Conveniences (a) insufficient ... ... ... 2 (b) unsuitable or defective ... ... 11 (c) not separate for the sexes 1 Total. 16 The total number of visits paid to factories was 391. Of these 16 cases of non-compliance with the Factories Act 8 were remedied following informal approach and one was referred to H.]\I. Inspector of Factories, the lemainder being outstanding at the end of the year. The number of Outworkers reported was :— Making etc. of wearing Apparel ... 2 Carding etc. of buttons etc. ... 8
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