SCHOOL MEDICAL SERVICES SIR,—The general public are gradually awakening to
the serious plight of education in London, though it is imposiible to feel that the promise of schools to be opened at an indefi- nite date; and then only for children over II years of age, will do more than provide educational crumbs for the 6o per cent. of the child population still here. But although concern is felt for the children's minds, we are less aware of the physical suffering that must result through the cessation of the School Medical Services.
In London diseases due to dirt were detected by routine school inspections by nurses, and cured by facilities offered at L.C.C. Cleansing Stations—known as School Bathing Centres. These Centres were closed immediately after the first evacu- ation, and though some were re-opened three weeks ago for the children volunteering to go to the country, for the re- mainder there is none of the system of inspection and com- pulsion that formerly held diseases such as impetigo, conjuncti- vitis, blepharitis, scabies, and vermin in check. There is every reason to believe that these highly contagious complaints are spreading both among adults and children.
Linked with this is the discontinuance of School Medical Inspections and closing of Treatment Centres, which together with the Care Committee Organisation, had been so carefully and successfully built up since 1906. If all this is allowed to lapse, the consequences in terms of defective sight, bad teeth, crooked limbs, and all other ills of the flesh, is impossible to contemplate.
Obviously the system could not run exactly as it did when all children were available for inspection in the schools, but the structure could be adapted to meet new conditions. We are trying to guard our children against bombs that may or may not fall, but meanwhile the ever-present forces of disease are allowed to range unchecked. Who can estimate the casualties they will produce?—Yours faithfully,
SYLVAIN VAN DE WEYER.
Toynbee Hall, a8 Commercial Street, London, E. r.
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