[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for Hammersmith Borough].

  • Hammersmith (London, England). Metropolitan Borough.
Date:
[1940?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)

Credit: [Report of the Medical Officer of Health for Hammersmith Borough]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    2/41 (page 2)
    2 Public Health Department, Town Hall, Hammersmith, W.6. To the Mayor, Aldermen and Councillors of the Metropolitan Borough of Hammersmith. Ladies and Gentlemen,—In accordance with the recom mendation of the Ministry of Health, the Annual Report upon the Health of the Borough for the year 1939, which I present herewith, is a very much abridged report and consists largely of a series of tables and statistics dealing with the vital services. It will be appreciated that, with the commencement of hostilities, the work of the Department was seriously dis organised, and practically all the public services had to be drastically curtailed. Early in the year most members of the Staff had been allocated to war-time duties, and immediately after the declaration of war these officers took their places in the Air Raids Precautions organisation. In consequence of the evacuation of many mothers and children to the country, a number of the infant welfare and ante-natal clinics were closed down. This allowed the Assistant Medical Officer to take over the supervision of First Aid Posts, and a number of the Health Visitors to act as Nurses in Charge. Some of the Sanitary Inspectors undertook the duties of Superintendents of Stretcher Party Depots, others acted as Liaison Officers at First Aid Posts, and the Food Inspector was transferred temporarily for service with the Food Control Committee. As a result of this depletion of staff the ordinary work of the Department was brought almost to a standstill. Inspections under the Housing Acts were suspended, and