in the
earliest possible date; and perhaps we should telegraph,
telegraph him time to enable him to delay his despatch
the question, if he has not
sent it already made it, until he has received and considered this
letter
a copy
A. F
9/7
AlC 117
ABC 1117-
in despatch 13579) to the governor I ask "I, before receiving it. he has already replied on despatch of 16 April, to' Whether it in any way modifies
CP.L
legraph
his views
23
at once
2.
3.
Re
The Public Health and Buildings Ordinance, 1905.
JUL GR
Jury 888
Page 23
With reference to the request to comment on the Public Health and Buildings Ordinance, 1903, I have the honour to state that the Ordinance does not provide for the appointment of a Sanitary Commissioner as recommended in Section 8 of original bill attached to the Report on the question of the housing of the population of Hongkong. It is essential to the sanitary welfare of the
Colony that there should be a chief administrative officer for
the Sanitary Department who should be skilled and experienced
in sanitary matters and who should devote the whole of his time to the duties of his office. The reasons are very fully given
in the Report on the causes and continuance of plague in Hongkong, para. 13, page 10, and also paras. 14, 15, 16, and I on pages 110 to 112 and show that the duties are such as to fully
occupy the whole time of the Sanitary Commissioner.
These duties cannot, in my opinion, be satisfactorily united with those of the Head of the Medical Department. In an important and thickly populated Colony such as Hongkong it is not practicable to combine the experience of a skilled physician, whose life work is spent in the treatment of the sick and in hospital management with that of an expert in Sanitary matters whose training in preventive work is of a totally different character and involves many years of special study and administrative experience.
The duties of the Head of the Medical Department, combining as they do the management, control and discipline of the several Government Hospitals, Hospitals for infectious diseases, Dispensaries, Asylums, Jails and the nursing staffs, together with the conduct of correspondence with Government on these matters, the general control of administration,