[Report 1947] / Medical Officer of Health, Westmorland County Council.

  • Westmorland (England). County Council.
Date:
1947
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: [Report 1947] / Medical Officer of Health, Westmorland County Council. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    5/50 (page 3)
    County of Westmorland Public Health Department, County Hall, Kendal. March, 1949. Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen, I have the honour to present my Annual Report for the year 1947. Once again there are several staff changes which are reported in detail on page 5. Chief of these was the resignation on 31st March, 1947, of Dr. J. M. L. Wright, who joined the staff of the Department in 1930 as Assistant County Medical Officer and who served during the war years as Joint County Medical Officer. Her services, par¬ ticularly as oculist, will be missed and/ I wish her well in her new appointment. There has been a slight increase in the population during the year and the excess of live births over deaths was 312. The Birth Rate of 18.89, though still below that for England and Wales, again showed a slight increase and created a new record for the County. The Death Rate was 14.06 per 1,000 of the population, as against 12.0 for the country as a whole. The commonest causes of death were heart disease, cerebral haemorrhage and cancer, in that order. There were no deaths due to or arising out of pregnancy or parturition. The Infantile Mortality Rate showed the low figure of 22.09 per 1,000, compared with 41.0 for England and Wales. It is difficult to point to any one factor which in itself is outstandingly responsible for this improve¬ ment, but credit must undoubtedly be given to the high level of profes¬ sional skill shown by the general practitioners and midwives within the County, and to the Council's Infant Welfare and Maternity Services. In connection with the Maternity and Child Welfare Service, the num¬ ber of domiciliary midwives qualified to use Gas and Air Analgesia has increased and the number of patients who were able to benefit from this increased from 122 to 204 during the past year. There has also been an increase in the attendance at the Infant Welfare Centres from 2,094 to 3,365—in other words, by one-third—in the course of a year. The Report of the Senior Dental Officer indicates that the time given to the Dental Care of Expectant and Nursing Mothers increased by 20 per cent, compared with 1946, but owing to the difficulty exper¬ ienced in retaining the services of the Dental Officers it is doubtful whether this improvement can be maintained.