Report of E. Nettleship on ophthalmia at the school in Hanwell.

  • Nettleship, Edward, 1845-1913.
Date:
1888
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Report of E. Nettleship on ophthalmia at the school in Hanwell. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by UCL Library Services. The original may be consulted at UCL (University College London)

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    ever, believe that you would do best to have the ''Isolation School on separate premises, at some distance from Hanwell, if you can acquire either a suitable building ready to hand, or ground on which temporary huts could be built. The children left behind at Hanwell would, I think, be more easily kept free from disease; the important alterations and additions contem- plated could be much more readily carried out; and, perhaps, the Ophthalmic children themselves would do better if the Isolation School were situated on a site drier and higher than Hanwell. But if no distant site can be obtained, I would urge the establishment of the Isolation School on your own estate, as far as may be from the ordinary Schools. It would, of course, be understood that the Isolation School should be a School,—not an Infirmary, or mere Convalescent Home,—but a School, with a Medical Officer attached. There should be regular teaching, but more time be spent out of doors than in the ordinary schooP. I believe I need not hesitate in advising a measure so radical, and one which must necessarily be costly. The attitude of your Board towards the whole subject of the children's health justifies me in believing that you are deter- mined, from the present time, to place the schools which contain the children of the City of London where they ought to be—in the forefront of all such Metropolitan institutions. Nor need I say much about the gravity of the particular disease in question, or the extraordinary difficulty of eradicating it when it has obtained a firm hold. The direct and indirect evils of Ophthalmia have been insisted upon over and over again^. 1 With a willing and active staff, not too trammelled by official routine, a good deal of school teaching may be given in the open air in the v^^arm half of the year. 2 Chronic Ophthalmia wastes the child's time at school, and therefore keeps him at a lower grade of education than that in which he should be. The disease often remains active, with intervals of comparative cure, for