SURVEY ADVOCATED

Dominion, Volume 38, Issue 22, 20 October 1944, Page 4

SURVEY ADVOCATED

Occupational Diseases Of School Teachers The New Zealand Educational Institute has suggested to the Government that while Dr. J. M. Davidson, H.M. Medical Inspector of Factories for the Home .Office, London, is in New Zealand on loan to the Health Department, he should be asked to investigate the occupational diseases of school teachers. “For several years now the institute in annual meeting has referred to the strain of teaching and. the occupational risk resulting from exposure to children’s infections,” says a letter from the executive to the Minister of Education, Mr. Mason. “If a survey could be undertaken by an expert into the effect on the health of children and teachers through beiug confined in overcrowded classrooms, and cold and' draughty buildings, facts would be available to the Government by the aid of which to lay plans for the future.

“The executive was interested to learn that the Minister of Public Works has a five-year plan for, his department, and, in the light of its long experience of teaching conditions, is certain, that similar plans would be of definite benefit to the education service.

“As the executive believes that the prevalance of illness amons children of school age and teachers might be caused in a large measure .by cold and unsuitable buildings and by the large classes that have to be accommodated in too restricted spaces, the members strongly urge the Government to utilize Dr. Davidson’s services while he is in New Zealand to make a survey of hygiene in the primary schools. The results of such a survey should' be no less valuable to the Government than the one Dr. Davidson is doing in the New Zealand factories. “The institute is aware that an immediate remedy cannot be found for the hygiene drawbacks under which so many of the schools at present labour, but it is of the opinion that some such survey as the one suggested would be a desirable and valuable first step to take in that direction.”