The Star. TUESDAY, JUNE 2, 1903. THE HEALTH ACT.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 7721, 2 June 1903, Page 2

The Star. TUESDAY, JUNE 2, 1903. THE HEALTH ACT.

Every since the discovery of a ca«e of small-pox in Lyttelton, it has been more than ever clear that the Public (Health Act, as applied to local bodies, contains defects which make its literal application a matter of extreme difficulty. These defects were emphasised; at some length by the Mayor of Christchurch. kst evening. For the- benefit of those people who are •unacquainted with those provisions of the Act which affect local bodies, Mr Wi grain went to some pains to explain them. While doing so he was able to furnish an example of the law's defectiveness which was in itself an overwhelming argument in favour of amendment. Briefly, the position in Christchurch is this:— The Public' Health Department is represented by a local officer who is controlled from Wellington, and ha» no connection with the City Council, which ia the local health authority under the Act. A third party, owing allegiance to neither Health Officer nor Council, is tho Hospital Board. Thus, in the city there are two distinct authorities as well as the Hospital Board, united by no legal bond and sometimes, as we have seen, disagreeing as to their several responsibilities. At the time of the plague scare last year, the City Council, representing the other local bodies here at the instance of the Health Department, erected an infectious diseases hospital, which, at the further instance of the Department, ib afterwards handed over to the Hospital Board. Not unnaturally the Council imagined that with the transfer of the hospital it had also transferred the onus of making provision for the oases of infectious disease. In this belief it nested' confident until last month, -when it was rather rudely awakenedi. A person suffering from measles was sent from, Sunnier to Ohristahurch for treatment. Here it might be supposed! was a case for the infectious diseases hospital, and) as this institution had passed under the' control of the Hospital Board' the Council, to whom the case was first ref em«d, sent it on to the Board. But the latter declined point blank to assist, and the Council was left with the fcaak of find u ing accommodation for the sufferer. It was this case which was quoted by the Mayor last night as an example of the unsatisfactory mature of the present system. It was quite sufficient alone to justify his subsequent declaration that the system is rotten. Rotten it undoubtedly is. Not only was its defecbiveness apparent in th.6 "liorridi example" mentioned by the Mayor, but it -was proved beyond a doubt a few" days later, when it became necessary to make provision for a possible outbreak of emall-pox. In the latter case the clumsdness of the present system was no less apparent than it was in the former. In both' the law was complied- with, but this result was due in op© case to private charity and in the other to the readiness of the City Council to assume a greater burden than in common fairness should shave been placed upon Hi. But even the patience of & City CouriM has ite limits. 'If it is strained 1 often enough it may give way altogether. That ths Christchurch Council shows signs of becoming weary of ffeeh c position in which, it has found! itself as representative of the local bodies is not surprising. The Health Act has taxed it sorely.