SANITARY REFORM.

Globe, Volume XXIII, Issue 2213, 30 March 1881, Page 2

SANITARY REFORM.

There is no part of tho injunctions of tho medical officer of health which is so often and so emphatically repeated as that to keep tho yards of dwelling-houses free from rubbish and accumulation. In order to enable householders to do this, wo believe there is a system by which the services of tho prototype of tho London dustman can ho procured. We say believe, because wo are given to understand that considerable difficulty is experienced even by those willing to conform to the recommendations of tho medical officer of health in having tho rubbish removed regularly. It is true that in the centre or business parts of tho city the carts are pretty regular in their visits, but it is not so in the immediate vicinity to tho heart of tho city. Here, though the population is fairly numerous, and tho dwellings, as a rule, close together, it has been found very hard indeed to ensure tho punctud visits of the dust carts. In one case, where strict orders wore loft for a weekly call, three weeks elapsed after tho first visit. What wo want to draw tho attention of tho Sanitary Committee to is this : It is now

very difficult ia the majority of cases to persuade a very largo proportion of the population to go to the expense of what they consider an unnecessary precaution. We know, from sad experience, that it is not so, as fever and a host of other diseases lurk in the heaps of rotting organic substances which are to be found at tho back doors of so many houses in Christchurch. It, therefore, when once tho people are educated up to the point of removing this fertile source of disease from our midst, is surely a mistake that, from some blundering ia departmental matters or other reason, they should bo checked, as it wore, at the very threshold of their endeavours to purify the portion of tho city wherein they dwell 1 This is not, be it observed, a merely individual matter, but one affecting tho whole community far more seriously than at first sight may appear to bo tho case. People finding that their endeavours to co-operato with tho public body or bodies having the care of the public health in carrying out sanitary measures, not only meet with no encouragement, but positively entail upon them a large amount of annoyance and trouble quite uncalled for, will have nothing whatever to do with the removal of these dust heaps. Tho thickly populated environs of Christchurch will grow up to bo hot-beds of disease, and as time rolls on it will bo found ten times more difficult to institute a thorough system of sanitary reform than it is now, because, not only will there bo the disinclination, so often met with, to keep the back yards clear of deleterious accumulations, but there will bo added to this, that people will say “we wished to carry out tho sanitary regulations so far as removal of rubbish, &c., but wore unable to do so because the authorities placed so many obstacles in the way.” This is the position the Sanitary Committee, or whoever ia responsible, is now placing tho city in. As shortly, no doubt, the City Council will resume its functions as a Board of Health, but with very much increased power, it behoves them to see that in the minor—though most important—points of sanitary reform every facility is afforded to the people to enable them to purify their dwellings. Whether the matter to which we have referred is under the control of the Sanitary Committee or the contractor is irresponsible we do not know, but there is one thing certain, that a reform of some kind is urgently needed.