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HONG KONG ANNUAL REPORT
returned after completing visits of observation arranged by the Home Office, which included the work of Dr. Barnardo's Homes, whilst the other two are taking respectively the Mental Health Course and Child Care Course at the London School of Economics. In June two Chinese Sisters of the Precious Blood Order received a Government contribution towards their passages, which made it possible for them to go to England for special training in child care.
There are now seven infant welfare centres run by volun- tary agencies, as distinct from those run directly under the Medical Department. The Society for the Protection of Children, which has established five of these centres, con- tinues its important work of safeguarding the health of babies from the poorest families in the Colony, and of enlightening their mothers on the domestic side of child welfare.
Women and Girls' Section. There are many factors lead- ing to prostitution which are common to most countries, large and small, rich and poor, developed and-under- developed. This position is, however, likely to be aggravated where, as in the case of Hong Kong, a crowded centre of urban population, already an international seaport, is further overcrowded by an influx of hundreds of thousands of refu- gees who have been uprooted from their homes in main- land China with a loss of possessions and a consequent disruption of their careers, family ties and traditional moral values. A proportion of the male population cannot afford to marry; a proportion of the female population is induced by chronic under-employment and keen competition for the less skilled jobs to seek a livelihood by any means at its disposal. Shortage of housing, high rents and high cost of living are other factors contributing to the existence of prostitution.
The Women and Girls' Section of the Social Welfare Office carries out statutory provisions for the welfare of girls in moral danger under the Protection of Women and