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be discovered is open to no suspicion and proves on the whole effectual. The
Lieutenant-Governor sees no objection to the issue of stringent orders to the
police to report at once to the Vaccine Superintendent the occurrence of any
case of small-pox within the city or suburbs. This will enable the vaccinators
to direct their operations to infected localities. It would also perhaps, in the
event of a threatening of epidemic, be advisable to direct the Superintendent
of vaccination to prosecute, under Section 269 of the Indian Penal Code, any
person who might be discovered unlawfully or negligently spreading infection.
The following note upon the section by Messrs. Morgan and Macpherson will
show how far it is applicable :—
" If a man is attacked by a contagious and deadly disease, and needlessly goes abroad
with it in the public way, or if a person carries out a child so infected, he does what he
may be supposed to know to be likely to spread the infection. And unless some lawful
occasion or reason for this conduct can be shown, as that the sick person had been directed
to be removed to a hospital, and that the removal was performed with due caution, the
act will be an offence punishable under this Section."
If one or two convictions were obtained by a judicious prosecution
under Dr. Charles's own eye, the due promulgation of this result, and the
calling of attention to the operation of the existing law, would materially aid
the Superintendents in giving advice to those affected to keep themselves apart
from the general crowd.
6. Metropolitan Circles.—The total number of vaccinations under the
three Superintendents is given in paragraph 29 of the Superintendent-General's
Report at 1,28,076 of which 99.42 per cent. succeeded.
7. Since the date of Dr. Charles's Report a medical officer (Surgeon
Powell) has been appointed to the charge of the metropolitan circle of
superintendence.
8. Dr. Charles is of opinion that a Surgeon on Rupees 1,050 per mensem
should be appointed to be Superintendent-General for Bengal with special
charge of the Presidency Circles. The Lieutenant-Governor is unable at present
to recommend increased expenditure upon a central office, while so much has
to be done to develope the system in the interior. Whether it may be possible
hereafter to appoint native Superintendents to all Mofussil charges, placing the
whole under one European Superintendent-General, is a subject which may
deserve the consideration of the Inspector-General of Hospitals, and is further
alluded to below.
9. The general character of the superintendence in the Metropolitan
Circles appears to have been satisfactory, and the operations of the department
have no doubt done much substantial good. Any proposal for the entertain-
ment of extra vaccinators should be separately submitted for orders. An
annual report of past administration is not the appropriate place for such appli-
cations. The Lieutenant-Governor can, however, hold out no hope at present
that extra expenditure of any kind will be sanctioned.
10. With reference to paragraph 31 of the Superintendent-General's report,
a communication will be addressed to the Governor of Chandernagore, showing
what has been done in the neighbouring British districts to introduce vaccin-
ation, and inviting attention to the subject.
11. The success which has attended vaccine operations in the neighbour-
hood of the capital, renders it worthy of consideration whether steps might
not now be taken to render the system in these circles to some. extent
self-supporting. This has been already suggested by Dr. Charles in the report
submitted with the letter No. 446, dated 8th November 1867, from the
Inspector-General of Hospitals. The Lieutenant-Governor will be glad if
the present Inspector-General will consider the point in communication
with Dr. Charles, and report on the best means of effecting this end, consistently
with the avowed object of Government which is to extend vaccination as far
as the means at its disposal will allow.
12. The Lieutenant-Governor remarks upon the special report submitted
by Dr. Charles in regard to the qualifications of Sub-Assistant Surgeons to be
Superintendents of vaccination, that if any considerable extension of the
syestem is to be made it must be by means of an agency considerably-less
expensive than European superintendence. The Inspector-General of Hospitals
should take this matter into consideration, in connection with the remarks