HH62/1/DUMFRI/15

Transcription

[Page] 14

INDUSTRIES.

Agriculture and allied pursuits form the principal industry of
the County. Of these dairy-farming constitutes a large part. It
is carried out in each District, under Bye-Laws which were first
carefully considered at a Conference of Representatives of the
Public Health and District Committees, afterwards by each District
Committee, and lastly by the Board of Supervision. On one point
only I have felt bound to disagree with these Bye-Laws. It is
that which leaves the cubic space for each cow in a byre undeter-
mined. The bye-law simply declares that it shall be "sufficient."
This leaves the matter too much to the judgement of the officials,
and will tend to cause friction in cases where there may be in the
official judgement overcrowding, though not perhaps in that of the
cow-keeper. A minimum cubic space ought, I think, to be insisted
upon and laid down in all bye-laws.
Of industries which come under the 30th section of the Public
Health Act, there are several examples in the shape of slaughter-
houses and one knackery. Some of the former are not kept quite
so cleanly as they ought to be, and in one at least the practice
exists of leaving the offal overnight in the same chamber in which
the meat is hung. The slaughter-house at Dornock, I have reason
to believe, is well conducted, but there are two objections to it
which must be stated. One of these is that a large dairy exists on
the same premises and under the same management, and another
that it is too close to the roadway and too near to dwelling-houses.
The first is probably the more important of the two, but both
objections would be removed if another site, preferably outside the
village, could be obtained for the slaughter-house.
The knackery to which I have referred is in the parish of
Dumfries. Complaints regarding it have reached us in an informal
manner, but it was difficult to get evidence that it was really a
nuisance, complainers refusing to come forward when asked, and
except in its immediate vicinity there was no effluvium nuisance
when we visited it. The owner is, however, about to remove to
what may prove to be a more suitable site. This I inspected along
with the Sanitary Inspector. It is beyond the prescribed distance
of a village or collection of houses, and therefore, unless the busi-
ness is conducted in such a way as to create a nuisance, not liable
to any regulation or special interference at the hands of the District
Committee.

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Bacon-curing is not a trade which comes under the Section
referred to, but it is one of those specially reported upon by Dr
Ballard, of the Local Government Board, as being, without due
care, likely to cause an effluvium nuisance. We have not received
complaints of any of the curing establishments in the County, nor
have we ourselves observed any nuisance when visiting the
localities in which they are situated. It may, therefore, be taken
for granted that hitherto they have been well conducted.
Other industries in the County do not affect the public health
except perhaps in the way of pollution of streams, of which I have
already spoken.

INFECTIOUS DISEASES.

Restricting the term "infectious" to those diseases which are
scheduled or to which the definition has been extended under the
Notification Act, the number of cases that have come to my
knowledge during the year in the six Districts has been 308. Of
these 297 were notified. The remainder were cases of deaths
appearing in the Registrars' returns, and had not been notified to
me during life. Some of them occurred either before the date of
my appointment or before the adoption of the Act in their respect-
tive Districts. The diseases scheduled in this Act are "small-pox,
cholera, diphtheria, membranous croup, erysipelas, the disease
known as scarlatina or scarlet fever, and the fevers known by any
of the following names: typhus, typhoid, enteric, relapsing, con-
tinued, or puerperal." Permission is given to extend the definition
to any other disease not specially named, and under this provision
measles has now been added to the above list in all the Districts.
The 11 unnotified cases which came to my knowledge included 4
scarlatina, 2 measles, 1 diphtheria, 1 typhoid, and 3 puerperal.
Table II, gives the respective notifications from each District:-

TABLE II.
Notifications Received during 1891.

[table inserted]