PUBLIC HEALTH
137
are operated by the Tung Wah Hospital Board of Directors, an entirely Chinese charitable organization which, besides these hospitals, is also responsible for various services to the poor and needy of the Colony. A large subsidy is now granted by the Government in respect of the hospitals and the Medical Superintendents of the three main hospitals are Government Medical Officers. These hospitals provide a most useful service and are gradually being modernized. The Board of Directors have planned to rebuild the Kwong Wah Hospital in Kowloon to provide a large modern general hospital of 1,200 beds. The first stage of this de- velopment started during the year and H. E. the Governor laid the foundation stone on 14th July 1958.
(ii) Mission hospitals range from the Hay Ling Chau Leprosarium of 605 beds (including 25 in the new wing opened this year) to small institutions with about 50 in-patients. They also vary from completely charitable in- stitutions supported by mission funds and local voluntary donations to nursing homes which are more or less self- supporting. Several of the purely charitable institutions receive substantial subsidies from the Government. In addi- tion to hospitals, there are a number of Homes for the blind, the deaf and the aged, and a large number of Orphanages. (iii) Hospitals maintained by the Hong Kong Anti-Tuberculosis Association, which have already been mentioned under Tuberculosis.
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Dispensaries. The Government maintains a large number of out- patient clinics varying from large institutions housing many special- ist services to small single-doctor dispensaries or even (in the New Territories) some dispensaries staffed by nurses and visited once or twice a week by a doctor. Again, there are special clinics for tuberculosis, for maternal and child health, for dentistry, for eyes, for leprosy and for dermatology and venereal diseases. In such circumstances figures for the number of individual institutions mean little as there is no means of distinguishing between the large and the small, but the numbers of separate institutions are :
Hong Kong Island
Kowloon
New Territories
15
14
13