BOARD OF HEALTH.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 1920, 20 April 1880, Page 2

BOARD OF HEALTH.

Monday, Aran 19. Tho Board met at the conclusion cf the business of the Drainage Board. Mr Harman occupied tho chair, and the members present were the same as those given above as attend’ng at the Drainage Board. The following report was read Horn tha Mediccl Officer: — Sir, —I have the honour to report that I have lately, on three occasions, examined the premises of Messrs. B. Wilkin and Co., Ford aud Co., and Matson and Co., hi Hereford street, with reference to the f-toreago of sheepskins, hides, and tallow. Although the weather has been recently cool, I ascertained enough to convince me that there premises, situated as they are in the centre of the town will require careful supervision. 1 wou.d suggest that on no account should skins be kept outside, uncovered from rein, or stored on ground unprotected hy asphalte or concrete ; and that pc-lts and tallow should not be received or stored for a longer time than is absolutely necessary for the hatcher; to cart them before and the buyer; to remove them after the sale. If these suggestions are not carried out, or found insuffic-eut to meet tho requirements for public health, it will, of course, be necesssary to reopen the whole subject. I would take this opportunity of again drawing the attention of the Board to the anomalous position the Health Officer is Traced in through not being able to ascertain the causes of death in the district' until the returns are forwarded to Wellington by the local registrar and published in the “Oazitle” by the Registrar-General. It will be within your recollection that in my last quarterly report, in con.iequer.ee of having found, from an inspection of the district registrar’s books, that three deaths had been registered from typhoid fever of which the Board had no knowledge, I recommended the Board to request the RegistrarGeneral to cause a weekly return cf deaths from zymotic diseases to he forwarded to the Health Office from the district registrar. As yet no answer has boon received. The position which tho Board occupies is this :—The medical officer’s report for the quarter ending March 31st, winch might have been before the Board at its last meeting, cannot be written until tho vital statistics for March arc published in tho “New Zealand Gazette,” towards the end of April, and even then the health officer cannot find out the names registered, and consequently cannot know, in the ease of infectious diseases, whether they have or have not been reported to the Board. As there is a statute (see 28th section of the Births and Deaths Registration Act, 1574) binding on registrars in England to furnish their returns to sanitary authorities at a fixed rate (twopence for »ach return, and twopence for each entry in the return), I trust the Board will, without farther delay, apply to the Government for information, to be supplied by the district registrar weekly, not only of deaths fr. in infectious diseases, but from all causes occurring within the district, so that the Health Officer may not be kept in ignorance of such important matters as the vital statistics of the district over which the Board exercises control. In the case brought yesterday in the Magistrate’s Court against a hoaseholder’for not reporting to tho Board tha existence of typhoid fever in his house, the counsel to tho Beard withdrew tho information, as the house surgeon to the Christchurch Hospital, into which the sick person was admitted, and from which the case had been reported, stated in hi; evidence that tha disease was not recognised as typhoid fever until two days after admission._ I refer to this case, as the house surgeon’s evidence with reference to the infectiousness cf typhoid fever is altogether nntru-tworthy and calculated to do much public mischief by making people careless in tho future as to tho observance of thosq sanitary regulations which it has been tbe object of all Boards of Health to see strictly carried out ns precautions against tho spread of typhoid fever. It is difficult to realise what the house surgeon was thinking of when he made the statement “ It was a moot point amongst the highest medical authorities whether typhoid fever was infections ” because if there is one subject upon which ail medical authorities are unanimous it is that the excreta from typhoid patients is infectious in a high degree. If typhoid fever is not infectious then such men as Sir Wm. Jeun-.r, Mr John Simon and Professor Parkcs are wrong, and sanitary Boards have been expending the ratepayers’ money and harassing the public unnecessarily. I have, Ac., Courtney Nedwill, M.D., Health Officer. Christchurch, April IGth. The Chairman quoted from the card issued by the late medical officer, and the notice issued in 1575 by the Government, drawing that typhoid fever was classed in both cases as infectious. A letter was read from the RcgistrarQeueral respecting the furnishing cf the Board with a weekly return of the deaths from zymotic diseases, pointing out that if the names and diseases were furnished to the Board of Health the Registrar wculd be so acting as to render the registration cf curse of death very likely to be omitted. The Re-gistrar-General suggested that tho medical officer should inspect the registers himself and extract therefrom the information ho required. If this were done he would instruct the Registrar to give the medical officer every facility. It was resolved to accept the offer of the Registrar-General with thanks. A report was road from tha inspector declaring the side channels in the Ferry road as a nuisance, and also the cast side of Crescent road, a nuisance under the Act. After the transaction of some further business the Board adjourned.