Tuberculosis services in Canada.

  • Canada. Department of National Health and Welfare.
Date:
1955
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Tuberculosis services in Canada. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    42/90 (page 24)
    CONTROL PROGRAMS, BY PROVINCE NEWFOUNDLAND. Tuberculosis has been Newfoundland's main physical health problem for many years. In 19145, inves- tigation revealed that the death rate from this cause in St. John's was more than ph cies times as high as the corre= sponding rate for Canada. Despite a substantial decline in deaths, in 1953 the rate was still more than twice as high as for Canada as a whole. In part, this high mortality results from the difficulty of providing accessible control services. Almost half of Newfoundland's population lives outside the Avalon Peninsula in small settlements of 50 to 300 persons, scattered along a six thousand mile coastline. Consequently, until recently the isolation of the average ~~~ outport raised the cost of hospital and clinic supplies to a prohibitive level; in late years, however, a compre- ~~~ hensive control program has been established. An anti-tuberculosis society, the Association for the Prevention of Consumption, was organized in Newfoundland as early as 1906. Further interest was evidenced in 1910 when the Imperial Order Daughters of the Empire opened the Mundy Pond Camp with six beds for women with pulmonary tuberculosis. Government participation began in 1912 when a Tuberculosis Public Service was initiated. This Service took over control of the existing sanatorium, expanding its facilities at the time of World War I. Educational activities at that time, however, were largely associated with summer tours of the sanatorium superintendent and two nurses to the outports. During the depression years of the early 1930's, pre- ventive measures lapsed. In 1936, an outpatient clinic was established in the sanatorium at St. John's to serve the local population. Two years later the Avalon Health Unit was organized in the Harbour Grace area. The unit provided a mobile clinic for the peninsula, combining mass x-ray and dispensary services.(2) It was transferred to St. John's in 1917 and reorganized under the name of the Tuberculosis Dispensary to provide a central diagnostic and treatment centre for that area and to coordinate tuber- culosis control activities throughout the island. (1) D.B.S. Tuberculosis Statistics, 1953, 132-133, and Nfld. Dept. of Health, Report on the Births, Marriages and Deaths in the Province of Newfoundland for the Year 1952. St. John's, Queen's Printer, 195]. (2) Despite its name, the Avalon Health Unit was concerned only with tuberculosis control and should not be con- fused with health units in other provinces. (3) Although the St. John's unit was called a dispensary, it functions as @ diagnostic and treatment clinic and is not a dispensary in the ordinary usage of the word.