[Report 1960] / Medical Officer of Health, Leicestershire / County of Leicester County Council.

  • Leicestershire (England). County Council.
Date:
1960
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: [Report 1960] / Medical Officer of Health, Leicestershire / County of Leicester County Council. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    9/136 (page 5)
    County Health Department, 17 Friar Lane, Leicester, December, 1961 Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen, I have the honour to present my Annual Report of the work of the County Health Department for the year i960. I must apologise for the unusual delay in completion and publication, due mainly to changes in senior administrative posts at unfortunate times in 1961. The usual statistics are furnished, and on the whole make satisfactory read¬ ing. The birth rate continues to show a slight rise, although this year there is also unfortunately a rise in the proportion of illegitimate births. The Mental Health Act, 1959, became operative in i960. Much work was done in bringing our services into line with the new ideas, especially in regard to re-organisation of training centres, but much remains to be done. One of our major problems will be recruitment and training of sufficient numbers of staff to operate the service. Shortage of trained staff is indeed a constant source of anxiety, and while this is especially evident in certain fields such as dentistry, nursing and mid¬ wifery and ancillary medical services, it is to some extent noticeable through¬ out the whole range of the Departments’ services. This is of course a national problem—indeed in some instances we are relatively fortunate in Leicester¬ shire—and it is one which as far as can be foreseen is unlikely to become less pressing in the future. It is probably no exaggeration to say that the factor which will limit the extent and efficiency of the Health and Welfare services is not so much difficulty in providing the necessary finance as difficulty in find¬ ing the necessary staff. We are all too prone to forget that however desirable good equipment and buildings may be, they are of no avail if the numbers or quality of the staff actually providing the service are inadequate. It is a pleasure to acknowledge my gratitude to the members of the Com¬ mittee for their kindness and consideration to myself and the staff of the Department and for their interest in the work under their control. The Chief Officers and staff of other County Council Departments, are unfailingly help¬ ful to us, while we are fortunate in the co-operation we receive from the many