BRITISH PUBLIC HEALTH

Dominion, Volume 31, Issue 271, 12 August 1938, Page 11

BRITISH PUBLIC HEALTH

Steady Improvement

Shown

SLUM CLEARANCE AND TOWN PLANNING

Record Low Figure For Maternal Mortality

(British Official Wireless.)

RUGBY, August 10. Presenting the annual report of the Ministry of Health, the Minister, Mr. Walter Elliot, claims that it shows a record of steady improvement in the health of the people. . Referring to the national health campaign, the report says that the full effect cannot yet be assessed, though figures of attendances at infant welfare centres and ante-natal clinics already give indications of its value in bringing home to many thousands of people, by means of leaflets, posters, films and public meetings, the scope and nature of the health services.

Statistics of public health generally show the maintenance 'of or improvement on the previous year’s figures. The maternal mortality rate in 1937 was 3.1 a thousand births, the lowest figure ever recorded. The section on public assistance records the total cost of out-relief at £16,829,000, as against £19,834,000 in the previous year. The year 1937 showed tr further great advance in the work of moving people from slums, and new provisions for the ' abatement of over-crowding and for improving the housing conditions of agricultural workers are also recorded. Since 1933, 800,000 people have been moved from slums into new houses. Property housing a population of 227,190 persons was cleared for the purpose of clearance by local authorities, who also'built 77,944 new houses, of which 56,726 replaced slum dwellings.

Planning Control.

Interesting passages in the report are devoted to the expansion of town and country planning. The acreage of land under planning control increased by 1,750,000 acres to a total of 24,163,000, representing nearly two-thirds of the total acreage of England and Wales. The importance and extent of the work discharged under local government control in Britain is shown by the figures relating to local finance given in the report. In 1935-36, the last period for which complete figures are available, local authorities collected £164,014,084 in rates, besides receiving £132,947,808 in grants from the Exchequer and £183,451,443 from other sources, such as trading undertakings and housing estates. During the same year they spent £470,884,559 on the revenue account.

The report is able to comment on two important developments in the field of national health insurance and pensions. New legislation has made available to boys and girls between the ages of 14 and 16 the medical benefits of the national health insurance and provided a scheme of pensions for “black-coated workers” and others outside the scope of compulsory insurance. ,