ENG-1967 — Page 142

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HEALTH

Service operates six full-time clinics equipped with radiological facilities and 16 subsidiary centres throughout the Colony. A total of 1,442,317 attendances was recorded.

The tuberculosis control programme is a combined effort between the Government Chest Service, the Hong Kong Anti-Tuberculosis and Thoracic Diseases Association and the Junk Bay Medical Relief Council. Certain other organizations, both charitable and private, including the Tung Wah Group, the Alice Ho Miu Ling Nethersole Hospital, the Sandy Bay Convalescent Home and the Caritas Medical Centre, also provide treatment facilities, maintained mainly with the aid of substantial government subventions. Co- ordination is achieved through a committee inaugurated in 1965.

The Colony has 1,765 beds available specifically for the treatment of tuberculosis and 6,322 patients were admitted to them during the year. The government provides 146 of these beds in Kowloon Hospital and St John Hospital on Cheung Chau Island, but the majority are in government-assisted hospitals, notably those man- aged by the Hong Kong Anti-Tuberculosis and Thoracic Diseases Association. This association offers a total of 979 beds distributed between Grantham Hospital, Ruttonjee Sanatorium and Freni Memorial Home. The Grantham Hospital has 619 beds of which 576 are maintained by the government on a daily fee-paying basis, while the Ruttonjee Sanatorium and Freni Memorial Home between them have 360 beds. These hospitals also offer approved training courses leading to the British Tuberculosis Association's certificate in nursing. The Junk Bay Medical Relief Council has 261 beds at its Haven of Hope Sanatorium, of which the govern- ment maintains 80. In addition, this organization has facilities for the rehabilitation of patients and for the observation of child contacts with positive tuberculosis reactions. The Tung Wah Group has a variable number of tuberculosis beds for the treatment of more chronic forms of the disease, while the Sandy Bay Convales- cent Home deals especially with bone tuberculosis in children and with other forms of children's illness requiring orthopaedic treat- ment. Acute cases are also dealt with at the Nethersole and Caritas hospitals.

Venereal diseases are diagnosed and treated free at clinics main- tained in Hong Kong, Kowloon and the New Territories. The