536
1
1.
PERSONNEL.
cont'd.
this staff, especially having in view obligations under the International Sanitary Conventions. He has, however, received nine Pritish other ranks as Sanitary Inspectors and they will help to relieve the situation. These men have not the qualifications required for civil Sanitary Inspectors. Col. Fehily also requested the services of an additional four ordinary grade Sanitary Inspectors, three of whom should have qualification in meat and food inspection. None of these has yet arrived.
Col. Fehily is handicapped greatly through lack of qualified clerical assistance. In the Civil Affairs establishment for the military period there were included posts for two staff captains, one of them to be personal secretary to the D.D.M. S. and the other to keep him right on the military aspects of his work; neither of these officers has been made available. At the moment all he has, apart from ordinary clerks, whose capacity is limited owing to the privations they have gone through, is the assistance of a Chief clerk who has been taken back after retirement and is past his best. As a matter of longer term policy, Col. Pehily requires the assistance of one secretary with two assistant secretaries, one with statistical experience, the former and one of the latter to be recruited from the U.K.
There is also an urgent need for an additional qualified Pharmaceutical Chemist; one has arrived but he needs assistance.
The staff of Nursing Sisters under the Civil Administration was limited to five when I first came to Hong Kong but since then about sixty Queen Alexandria sisters have arrived. Col. Fehily keeps his principal matron at headquarters and she acts as superintendent of the nursing establishment as a whole.
Col. Fehily will summarize his specific needs in respect of these various officers and forward a note of this through the C.C.A.0. All I do at the moment is to stress generally the urgent needs for trained health staff, which should receive first priority.
Longer term needs are a School Medical officer who is capable of organizing a proper School Medical service; conditions in regard to school hygiene are dealt with later in the report. In addition, Col. Fehily requires a trained Health Sister, whose duty it would be to train logal staff and initiate a proper service for schools and/community service. I understand one qualified Health Sister has already been asked for.
The position with regard to specialist staff is more satisfactory. A dental surgeon has been asked for to organize a dental service for schools; two locally
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