Report on the public health / Southern Rhodesia.

  • Southern Rhodesia. Department of Health.
Date:
[1946]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Report on the public health / Southern Rhodesia. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    5/58
    Report on the Public Health for the Year 1946. p The Minister of Internal Affairs. I have the honour to submit the Annual Report of the Public Health Department for the year ended 31st December, 1946. The year has been marked by important changes in the Public Health Department. In April, Dr. A. P. Martin, O.B.E., retired from the office of Medical Director and Chief Health Officer. His very valuable services in that capacity extended over ten years, of which the majority were rendered the more difficult by the additional burdens of war. In spite of the resultant conditions in respect of staff and equipment, Dr. Martin has left an imperishable mark on the Public Health system of the Colony and he will always be remembered with gratitude for his wise guidance in the years of the Colony’s development. In particular eighty-seven clinics for Africans and a Tuberculosis Sanatorium remain as permanent monuments to his initiative and organising ability. In May the National Health Services Inquiry Commission appointed in 1945 under the Chairmanship of Professor C. M. F. Saint, C.B.E., F.R.C.S., presented a report which is a valuable review of every aspect of the National Health. Since its publication this report has received very close study not only in this Department but by all sections of the community. It may be divided into two divisions. The first deals with the re-organisation of the Public Health Department and its manifold activities as a whole. The further consideration of these recommendations now awaits the attention of the Public Services Board. The other division covers recommendations for a National Health Service. These have been given close and detailed study by an Inter-departmental Committee, which has forwarded its findings. The problems involved have been debated in Parliament and are now the subject of negotiations with the medical profession as represented by the British Medical Association branches. In May also the Ngomahuru Hospital Inquiry Commission under the Chairmanship of Dr. A. J. Orenstein, C.B., C.M.G., C.B.E., issued a report on the leprosy services of the Colony. With the exception of the future of the Mtemwa Hospital at Mtoko, all these recommendations have been accepted and it has been possible already to implement many of them. Dr. H. van R. Mostert, an experienced leprologist, assumed duty as Medical Superintendent at Ngomahuru in September. Congenial paid work has been found for European patients, but unfortunately other essential improvements have been delayed by the scarcity of artisans and building materials. For several years attention has been drawn to the urgent need for more intensive investigation into the extent of malnutrition among the native population, and into the best means of remedying this. The National Health Commission gave a high priority to the establishment of a Nutrition Council and steps have since been taken to bring such a body into being in 1947. Other questions of medical research and investigation have continued to be studied throughout the year. The Bilharzia Research 'Unit has done valuable field work with a view to standardising a combined method of attack against this disease. The principle involved is simultaneously to kill the snails in the water-courses of an area whilst all the humans are tested and treated by methods elaborated within the Colony. It is probable that in this way Southern Rhodesia is leading the world in original investigations against the disease. Hitherto the financial support has come from the State Lottery Trustees, to whom grateful thanks are offered, but from next year this work will be entirely undertaken and financed by Government. The overall medical research organisation of the Colony has received much attention especially towards closer co-operation, through the Medical Sub-committee of the Central African Council, between Southern Rhodesia and our Northern neighbours. The aim has been to secure collaboration in questions of medical investigations, the exchange of information, the training of subordinate African personnel for medical and hygiene purposes, and in securing uniformity of elementary requirements in housing, sanitation and ration scales. It is hoped that these preliminary steps will lead to the creation of a Medical Committee which can take its place in the proposed