DIRTY DARWIN.

Taihape Daily Times, Volume XI, Issue 3460, 14 April 1920, Page 6

DIRTY DARWIN.

Giving evidence on the 12th invst., before the Northern Territory Commission,‘ Dr M; J. Holmes, ex-health and quarantine officer in the Territory between 1911 and 1916, described the condition of the Darwin Hospital when he took charge. The interior of the building, he said, was unspeakably filthy_ The Chinese

Patients having no conveniences, Silnply ignored all decency. The DI3OB was noisome in the extreme. As: the result, the Chinese kitchen boy con—tracted typhoid——ill the hospital. The sm-gical operations were condu-cted in an old dispensary or out-patients’ room, which it was impossible to keep clean. The hospital roofis: leaked. Mr Justice Ewing: It was a gdod place to keep out of if you didn’it want to die. ~ .= .. -

Witness said he immediately undertook sanitary improvements. The whole structure was scraped out. Mr Morley: “Scraped.” out.’ Witness explained that the scrappiiig wars: preliminary to the replastering of the walls and re-painting. New lavatory and drainage accommodation was provided, and an operating

theatre and a laundry were erected;

also a morgue. - Mr Justice Ewing, referring to the atmosphere of dirt at Darwin, remarked that when he took posSeSSion 01’ the Judge’-se room there he was apyballed by the environment of cobwebs, hornets’ nests, and general filth that seemed to be the accumulation of years. “I don’t know how the Judge stood it. I have never 56911 anything like it in my life.l’ He had the room made as sanitary as possible before taking possession. Dr Holmes pointed out that a hor-p net could build a. nest in two ‘Efays. ’ Mr Morley: Apparently the Judge ’s‘ room was not the only place in Darwin, your Honor, where there were hornets’ nests. f Mr Justice Ewing: “I think I can isafely say that there was: at least a Iyear’s accumulationof filth in the Judgefs room when I saw it.” It was not denied that improvements -had been made to the hospital, but one of the complaints made was that money. voted by Parliament for the erection of a maternity Ward had been used for the building of nurses’ quarters.