Report on the Wey valley floods in relation to public health / by the Consulting Medical Officer.

  • Surrey (England). County Council
Date:
1913
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Report on the Wey valley floods in relation to public health / by the Consulting Medical Officer. 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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    The County Council formerly exercised a wide influence in con- nection with that branch of sanitary administration which concerns Water Supply and Drainage, including the protection of underground sources and the preservation of supplies generally. It is now neces- sary to consider the over abundance of water in times of very heavy rainfall which leads to the destruction of property and health due to the overflow of the drainage from the main channels of the River Thames and its tributaries. “ The Drainage Problem,” as it has been called, is a wider one than that of sewerage, house connections, and surface road drainage. At the Committee Meeting of the 21st inst., Sir Edmond Elies brought forward a report to him by J. A. Shirer, Esq., of Send, on behalf of the Wey Valley Floods Prevention Association of which he (Mr. Shirer) is the Hon. Sec. This deals chiefly with the more or less immediately practicable measures of control. Amongst these is the regulation of the Weirs of the Navigable River and Canal. On this important part of the whole subject Sir Edmond moved for an adjournment of its consideration in order that he might confer with the Clerk to the Council and secure his valuable opinion on the legal questions involved. He has invited me to assist at the conference. With regard to a different point which arises out of my special investigation, I have already referred to a letter from Mr. Tansley Luddington, J.P., a life-long resident of Ely and its neighbourhood, in which he describes in general terms the nature of the Cambridge- shire Fen District Drainage works so productive of good results. Among the various manifestations of illness attributable to formerly bad conditions of the soil was one locally known as Brow-Ague. V ith regard to this affection of the nervous system, Dr. Goodman, now a member of the Surrey County Council, who knows the medical history of the Fens, has kindly favoured me with a note on the nature of “ brow-ague,” in the course of which he says, I have never been sure that brow-ague was not either supra-orbital neuralgia or migraine.” These are both sometimes due to dampness. In this connection the report, made long ago, by Dr. Julian Hunter (\ ol. I., Simon’s Series of Reports already cited) on the kinds of illness prevalent among the workers in the undrained fen districts, may be consulted.—E.C.S., October 24th, 1913.]