Statistical analysis of infant mortality and its causes in the United Kingdom / by Helen M. Blagg.

  • Blagg, Helen M.
Date:
1910
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Statistical analysis of infant mortality and its causes in the United Kingdom / by Helen M. Blagg. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    33/58 (page 21)
    III. REMEDIES. It is quite impossible to write on such a subject as infant mortality without touching on the remedies which have been proposed, and which in some cases have actually been put to the test for shorter or longer periods. It will be seen from Table V. that the majority of towns of over 100,000 inhabitants employ the services of health visitors, several have municipal milk depots, one (Sheffield) gives out dried milk in the summer months, and a few have undertaken the feeding of necessitous mothers before and after confinement. Remedies can be roughly classified under the following heads:— {a) Education. The elder girls in the elementary schools should be taught simple rules of hygiene, the care of their own health, and the feeding and care of infants. Education for the mothers can be given by trained midwives, health visitors, or by the distribution of cards or leaflets of instruction. Where there is a milk depot the mothers who come for milk can receive instruction. Health visitors have been appointed in a very large number of towns, and in many districts there are lady sanitary inspectors who combine the duties of health visitors. In some towns there are voluntary workers who visit under a trained lady inspector or health visitor, or under the medical officer. Where the Notification of Births Act (1907) has been adopted, their duty is to visit the house where the birth is notified and give instructions where necessary as to the feeding of the child, etc. A return visit is paid if it seems