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Annexe A.
PLAGUE.
There are at present four Plague Inspectors for the City of Victoria. and one for Kowloon. There are eleven coloured Foremen Interpreters, one for each District of the City of Victoria and one for Kowloon, who supervise the work of the rat-catchers, assist in the house-to-house cleansing, and act as Interpreters to the Inspectors where necessary. There are four gangs in the City of Victoria each consisting of one Chinese Foreman, one artisan and seven coolies, while Kowloon has a gang consisting of a Chinese Foreman, two artisans and ten coolies.
During non-epidemic periods the whole of this staff is engaged in house-to-house clean- sing work, about ten houses or thirty floors a day are dealt with, and each tenant receives three days' notice, on a form in English and Chinese, similar to the sub-joined, marked A, requiring him to thoroughly cleanse his premises. On the day fixed the gang attends in the street in which the houses are situated, and supplies hot water and soap solution to the tenants, and cleans out all empty floors, basements, etc., the tenants themselves cleaning out their own premises. The refuse turned out during this cleansing is removed by the gang to the nearest dust boat. The soap solution is also used by the tenants for washing their bed- boards, etc., in the street or on the verandah.
When the cleansing work is completed by the tenants the Inspector visits every floor, accompanied by the Foreman Interpreter and some of the coolies with a bucket of Pesterine (liquid fuel) which is applied to the sides and corners of the floors, and to the skirtings and round the partitions of the cubicles, and the corners of the stairs, by means of the mops, under the personal supervision of the Inspector. Pesterine is a black treacle-like liquid which stains woodwork and it was decided therefore at the latter end of the
The tenants
year to substitute for it a mixture of equal parts of Cyllin and Petrol diluted with water to 1 in 200. This mixture acts both as a pulicide and a germicide and has the advantage of not staining the flooring and skirtings. The solution has to be freshly mixed each day as it undergoes certain chemical changes, the nature of which has not yet been worked out. At this visit when the floors are clear of furniture, etc., the Inspector makes special note of the condition of the ground surfaces, the absence of gratings to drain-inlets and ventilators, and the pres- ence of rat-runs, and all these matters are dealt with by legal notice at once. are invited, by notice in the form attached, to allow their bedding and spare clothing to be steamed, in order to destroy fleas and other vermin and their ova, and compensation is offered for all articles damaged. Should a case of Plague occur in a house, the Kaifong (Street Committee), of the District are informed, and the floor on which the case has occurred is disinfected by the Plague staff, the walls being sprayed with corrosive sublimate, and the floor and the bed-boards washed with the mixture of Cyllin and Petrol: crude carbolic acid is poured into the rat-runs, which are then filled up with cement; and the clothing and bedding is sent to the Disinfecting Station to be steamed. The remaining floors of the infected house are cleansed by the tenants in the same manner as in the house-to-house cleansing. Should there be any ceilings or stair-linings in the infected house they are removed and compensation is paid for them, if the case has been duly reported, while illegalities are dealt with by notice. The compensation is, in the case of Chinese, assessed separately by the Kaifong of the district and by the Plague Inspector, and their assessments are dealt with by a Committee of the Sanitary Board. The Kaifong are appointed by the Government on the nomination of the Tung Wa Hospital for the City of Victoria, and in Kowloon by the inhabitants of Kowloon Point, Yaumati and Hunghom respectively.
Any spare time at the disposal of the Plague Inspectors is occupied in paying special visits to houses in which cases of Plague have occurred in the previous season, with a view to secing that they are free of rat-runs and provided with impervious ground surfaces.
The Chinese have established Public Dispensaries and also District Plague Hospitals which in the City of Victoria are managed by a Committee of which the Registrar General and the two Chinese Members of the Sanitary Board are members; in Kowloon, a local Committee manages the Dispensary and the Hospital. These institutions are supported by voluntary contributions, and each is in charge of a Licentiate of the Hongong College of Medicine who sees out-patients at the Dispensary, performs vaccinations, visits patients in their own homes, and treats patients in the District Hospital. Cases of infectious disease are notified by these licentiates to the nearest District Sanitary Office, and if the case is one of Plague, the patients may be treated in the District Hospital.