MANCHESTER.

1728 the meat inspector. Dr. Brown, chairman of the health committee, said that a large amount of the meat was brought into the town, but the authorities knew those who dealt in doubtful meat, all of which was strictly In Cheshire there are, or were quite recently, " men who were well known to be nothing but °’ slink Worklaouse COOMM’MM. : butchers. They apparently went openly about their business, THE various boards of guardians of Manchester are still none making them afraid, which looks as if the present legal the best way of lessening the overcrowding of the sale of bad meat were insufficient. their hospitals. In the Manchester township last week the prosecutions against Plarfue Precautton. question arose as to whether "or not the guardians had the It is satisfactory to know that our local authorities are pulmonary tuberculosis with power of detaining cases of expectoration." Notwithstanding the reply of the Local keenly alive to their responsibilities. At the last meeting Government Board to an inquiry from South Stoneham, that of the port sanitary authority the medical officer, Mr. W. F. it:could be done under Section 22 of the Poor-law Amend- Dearden, reported that in compliance with the requirements ment Act, 1868, the clerk said that no board of guardians or of the Local Government Board he had instituted an inquiry any other authority had power to detain a case of consumption, as to the extent to which the wharves and warehouses of while one member of the board remarked, " the guardians are the port were infested with rats and the methods adopted absolutely powerless in one of the most appalling parts of to keep down their number. He had been assisted by the their;work."At the meeting of the South Manchester guardians general superintendent of the Ship Canal Company. It was on Nov. 25th the overcrowded state of the children’s ward ascertained that since the practice of keeping cats in the at)the hospital was brought up. The workhouse committee warehouses had been adopted the number of rats had been had recommended that a children’s hospital should be built considerably kept down ; that they were very seldom noticed with 300 beds, and so arranged as to be easily extended. This in the transit sheds, and that no dead rats were found among was discussed pro and con., but on the motion of Mr. F. B. cargo. The Ship Canal Company and all others concerned Hargreaves was referred back. He said that many of the beds had been warned to keep a sharp look-out for dead rats, and were occupied by cases which ought not to be there. Another to advise the medical officer of any unusual mortality among difficulty they have to contend with is the number of phthisical them. If rats were absolutely exterminated, which is a At present there are 141 male very distant possibility, the purpose of their existence might cases under their charge. and 77 female consumptives, while there was only provision be revealed to us. Their disappearance, it seems, would made for 96 men and 36 women. Dr. T. N. Orchard said that result in no dangerous disturbance of Nature’s scheme, but is 69 cases were distributed among other wards. There was no not certain that the pulex would then find another host1 isolation of phthisis. Dr. Garrett, another medical guardian, The Manohester Hospital for Incurables. took a more serious view apparently than his colleague, and The annual meeting of the Manchester Hospital for there can be no doubt that there is overcrowding both of children and consumptives, and no time should be lost in Incurables was held on Nov. 30th. There are two homes remedying the evil. In the Prestwich union they are devoted to this work, one at Mauldett, Heaton Mersey, troubled with an excess of lunatics, who are not fit to go and the other at Walmersley House, near Bury. Of these outand for whom no room can be got elsewhere. No help patients 102 are free, while there are 16 for whom full or is to be obtained from the Prestwich Asylum, for that is also partial payment is made. There are also 12 pensioners who overcrowded. All this reveals a very serious state of affairs. receive 920 a year. Those who visit the homes testify to the comfort and to the surprising cheerfulness of the patients, Value of Light. for whom the prospect must be inexpressibly sad. Being a November is a dark month at the best, and if, as in most useful and humane, as well as a charitable institution, chester, the darkness is intensified by the black pall of :one looks, unfortunately, but too often quite as a matter of that broods over the city, it only needs the addition of an course, for an adverse balance-sheet. In this case, atmospheric fog to convert the city into something terror- it is not more than f.335. All should sympathisehappily, in such exciting, something only fitted for the wanderings of lost work and the deficit ought immediately to be wiped out.; The Manchester and Salford Sanitary Associasouls. Dec. 6th. tion and the Smoke Abatement Society have done what they could to lessen the production of smoke, but without making any very great impression on conditions WALES AND WESTERN COUNTIES. due to such complicated causes. On Dec. 2nd a (FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENTS.) deputation from the former society interviewed the gas committee of the corporation with the view of obtaining a reduction in the price of gas, as the increased use of gas The Medical Treatment of’Sahool Children. will modify the production of smoke. Mr. T. C. Horsfall IN spite of the powers given to local education authorities urged that in Manchester the people were debarred from the by Section 13 (b) of the Education (Administrative Proagency of fresh air and light owing to the prevalence of visions) Act, 1907, to make arrangements for attending smoke and fog, which were highly detrimental to the healthy to the health and physical condition of children edudevelopment of the citizens. The deputation had come to cated in public elementary schools, few authorities beg the committee to encourage the use of gas in have made use of their powers. As a result a large place of the small smoky fires by a reduction in its number of children found defective on medical examinaprice. Sir Alfred Hopkinson, Vice-Chancellor of the tion are being treated in the general hospitals. The University of Manchester, supported these views, and hoped governing bodies of a few of these institutions have that the magistrates would deal with gradually increasing protested, more or less successfully, against the adoption severity with those responsible for the production of black of this course. The latest to do so is the board of managesmoke. Others of the deputation spoke, but without producing ment of the Herefordshire General Hospital, who passed a any very perceptible impression on the chairman of the gas resolution on Dec. 3rd that after June 30th, 1911, such committee. He was sympathetic, but pointed out that he children would not be eligible for treatment at the hospital. had to find .B50,000 a year out of the gas profits for the This decision was arrived at after the board had considered relief of the rates. It is a question worth considering a memorandum which had been drawn up by the medical whether it would not be more economical in the long run to staff of the hospital. In that memorandum it was pointed improve the public health by spending this money in cheap- out that the object of voluntary hospitals should be to relieve ening the price of gas rather than in relieving the rates, that large body of poor people who were just above those which relief, by the way, is shared by the non-users of gas. whom the local authorities were empowered by the LegisAn improved public health is a splendid economy for a lature to treat out of public funds, and yet who were not in a position to pay for special or costly treatment by their own community. ° Slink Meat. medical man. It was further pointed out that neither the There must be a roaring trade in slink " meat in our money of subscribers nor the endowments of hospitals were large towns if what came to light in Preston the other day ever intended to relieve the rates by doing the work either may be taken as a fair illustration. During the past few of the Poor-law or education authorities, so that these’bodies, weeks no less than 7106 pounds had been ordered to be in attempting to make use of such a charity as a hospital

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MANCHESTER. (FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT,)

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