[Report 1947] / Medical Officer of Health, Canterbury Borough / City & County.

  • Canterbury (England). City & County Council.
Date:
1947
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

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

    7/52 (page 5)
    PUBLIC HEALTH DEPARTMENT ;Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen,— 1 have the honour to present the Annual Report for the year 1947. It is the wish of my esteemed predecessor in the office of Medical Officer of Health, Dr. W. Goronwy Evans, that there is recorded an expression of thanks to the staff of the Public Health Department for their loyalty and hard work during his term of office. In this I concur most willingly, finding that I have inherited a staff full of enthusiasm for i)ublic service. Something of the sentiment of this ancient monument lingers on. Some parts of this annual report as a description of present services are more out of date than annual reports usually are, for 1948 has seen big changes in the form and direction of public health and hospital services, and 1947 has therefore pas.sed far behind. But the changes have not presented many greater difficulties to this department than that of squeezing a lot of hard work into a very few months, which shows that the public health services which existed were up to the times, and were easily shaped into the health services of 194S. An annual report, however, is meant to be read, and such inclusions as the Senior Sanitary Inspector’s letter and the comments of the Medical Director of the Child Guidance Clinic make up for any out-dating in other parts. I confidently commend these sections to your attention. The statistics for the year I'ead well, with a low Infant Mortality of 34.8 per 1,000 live births. It was a year of higher incidence of whooping cough and measles, which raised the figures for Infectious Diseases. The district was fortunate in having so few cases of acute poliomyelitis whilst the country was in the throes of an epidemic. The problem of greatest magnitude to-day • is housing, greatly aggravated (i) by the needs of ex-Service men now hoi)ing to settle after the war’s disturbance of those important early years of married life, (ii) by loss of hou.scs by bomb damage, and (iii) by the reduction of house building during the war. Isolated cases of serious overcrowding still arise, mostly through the grown-up members of a family settling in their parents’ home after marriage for want of other liousing. The public hear little of the hard work put in by councillors and officials in bringing available resources to bear on the pro])lem. Attention is called to the following services. A new Infant Welfare Clinic has been started at Wincheai) on ]\Ionday afternoons in the Infant Department of Wincheap School. Arrangements have been made for the dental care of expectant and nursing mothers and pre-school children with the provision