ENG-1964 — Page 135

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HEALTH

Dental Service on a restricted scale. However, with the introduc- tion of the new School Medical Service, the School Dental Service was discontinued as expansion to care comprehensively for the whole school population was not practicable.

The general dental service undertakes complete dental care for all monthly-paid government officers and their families and a limited treatment programme for in-patients of government hos- pitals, prisoners and inmates of training centres. The service also provides emergency treatment for the general public at certain clinics. There are 28 government dental clinics and a mobile unit serving the New Territories.

Fluoridation of Hong Kong's urban water supply began in 1961, and most of the population now receives water which has been treated with sodium fluoride or sodium silico-fluoride as a preven- tive of dental caries. The rate of enrichment is 0.7 parts of fluoride per million in summer and 0.9 parts per million during the winter. Many voluntary bodies and welfare organizations, particularly the Hong Kong Dental Society and the St John Ambulance Brigade, maintain free or low-cost dental clinics and many dentists give their services free. The Church World Service and Lutheran World Service each operate a fully-equipped mobile dental clinic.

TRAINING

The University of Hong Kong confers the degrees of MB, BS which have been recognized for registration by the General Medical Council of the United Kingdom since 1911. Post-graduate clinical training is available in the Colony for higher qualifications awarded by most of the examining bodies in Great Britain. The Panel for Post-graduate Medical Education, consisting of University and government staff members, supervises this training. Due mainly to this programme over two-thirds of the specialist appointments in the Medical and Health Department are now held by locally- recruited staff. Facilities at the University and at the Queen Mary Hospital are now being expanded to increase the number of graduates from fifty to eighty a year.

Hong Kong has no local facilities for training in dentistry but a government dental scholarship scheme each year enables a number of students from Hong Kong to study dentistry overseas and ultimately to qualify as dental surgeons.

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