4
training course required for this qualification, so that if reasonably attractive-
scales of pay were offered, there would be no lack of suitable applicants. Unfor-
tunately many local boards decline to offer suitable salaries, and, as a result, they
only obtain men who are otherwise unable to earn a living.
12. The Public Health Department has made every effort during the past
three or four years to improve the district and municipal vaccination staffs, and in
accordance with G.Os. No. 931-P.H., dated 2nd June 1926, and No. 569, L. &
M., dated 1st March 1924, steps have been taken to inspect the work of all
unqualified and undesirable vaccinators, so that a final recommendation might be
made as to their retention or dismissal by the local boards concerned. Where
exemption by the Director of Public Health is finally refused, payment of the
salary has been declared illegal and surchargeable, and, in certain cases, it has
been necessary to make use of this argument, before undesirables have been,
finally got rid of.
13. Despite the orders of Government in G.O. No. 1415-P.H., dated 13th
August 1926, only one or two District Boards have agreed to make vaccination
compulsory. In view of the fact that in some districts smallpox still continues to
break out in virulent form, it is to be hoped that the District Boards concerned
will shortly see their way to adopt the repeated recommendations of the Public
Health Department made in this connexion.
In those areas where vaccination is compulsory, the regulations, of course,
must be enforced, or progress will be slow. In Pattukkottai Taluk, for instance,
of the 67 defaulters recommended for prosecution by the District Health Officer,
Tanjore, not one was sanctioned by the Taluk Board President. Difficulties such
as these would disappear if Presidents of Local Boards would delegate the power
of sanctioning prosecutions to their District Health Officers. Delegation of
powers in this connexion has been granted to the District Health Officers
concerned by the President, Taluk Board, Uppinangadi, and the President, Taluk
Board, Berhampur, and has been used successfully by these officers. It would
be to the benefit of all concerned were the Presidents of other Local Boards to
follow these examples.
14. In contrast with the complaints made in previous reports, it is pleasing-
to be able to state that in certain districts the punishments awarded by the
magistrates in respect of vaccination offences were so exemplary that a distinct
improvement was secured in those areas. It is to be hoped that this change of
attitude will spread rapidly over the whole magistracy in the Province.
15. Extension of Act III of 1899 throughout the Presidency has been
constantly urged in previous reports, and the fact that very large numbers of
unrecorded births and deaths are detected by the health staffs year after year
emphasizes the need for the early introduction of this measure. In their review
of last year's Vaccination Report, Government remarked that this subject was
separately under consideration. It is requested that early orders on the subject
may be issued.
16. The maintenance of village vaccination registers is still unsatisfactory in
many instances, but health staffs have made constant efforts to rectify defects by
making house-to-house enquiries in the villages they visit.
17. The anti-vaccination campaign in Tanjore District, which was alluded to-
in last year's report, has developed in intensity, and was one of the main causes for
the decreased numbers vaccinated in that district and for the wastage of large
quantities of lymph.
18. With regard to the supply of equipment to vaccinators by Taluk Boards,
it is to be regretted that in a number of instances the necessary purchases were
inordinately delayed. The District Health Officer, Vizagapatam, reports that
his indent for the supply of equipment has not yet been sanctioned by the Vizia-
nagram Taluk Board although the last supply was made as far back as 1924, and
similar delays have occurred in other districts.
These difficulties would never arise if supplies were made in the first
instance by the district boards and necessary adjustments made later between
them and the taluk boards.