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179. All the water is surface water and most of it is collected from catchment areas which are free from ordinary risks of pollution. The water, after storage for a longer or shorter period in impounding reservoirs, is filtered in some cases by slow sand filters, in others by the rapid system, and finally it is chlorinated.
180. Routine examinations are carried out by the Government Bacteriologist and Government Analyst and the results furnished to the Water Authority. The results show that the water as supplied to the consumer is of excellent quality.
Clearance of Bush and Undergrowth.
181. Generally speaking in Hong Kong and the New Territories bush and undergrowth is little in evidence except in those places where it has been planted and conserved. Routine cutting of superfluous undergrowth is carried out in May and October,
Sanitary Inspections.
182. On the staff of the Sanitary Department there are 56 European Sanitary Inspectors and six probationary Asiatic Inspectors. There are neither Health Visitors nor Public Health Nurses. Each Sanitary Inspector has for supervision a district with approximately 25,000 inhabitants most of whom are ignorant of the very rudiments of sanitation. Under their supervision come tenement houses, lodging houses, places of common assembly, eating houses, bakeries, dairies, markets, laundries, etc., etc. It is physically impossible for these men to carry out the number of inspections necessary to ensure a proper standard of sanitation and much that should be done must necessarily be left undone. Work in connection with the routine cleansing of houses takes up much of the time of the Inspectors and there is little left for other necessary action.
183. Except in the matter of house cleansing matters are not satisfactory.
Common Lodging Houses.
184. Boarding Houses, which include every place where any person is harboured or lodged for any kind whatsoever of hire or reward and where any domestic service whatsoever is rendered by the owner, lessee, principal tenant, occupier, or master to the person so harboured or lodged, but which do not include any boarding house for non-Chinese seamen within the meaning of the Merchant Shipping Ordinance, are licensed and controlled by the Secretary for Chinese Affairs under the Boarding House Ordinance.