426 MEDICAL SECTION 



indicate later how I would propose to get over 

 some of these difficulties. I believe then that the 

 only procedure which will improve the present 

 unsatisfactory condition of affairs is the compulsory 

 intimation of pregnancy. Educating the people, 

 holding of meetings, scattering leaflets abroad, is 

 futile. Again I maintain that the prospective mother 

 should be compelled to intimate to the Medical 

 Officer of Health that she is pregnant. This may 

 be done by herself, her husband, or her doctor, but 

 where the woman or husband make the intimation, 

 the Health Department can only accept that 

 intimation after it has been confirmed by a medical 

 practitioner. When intimation is made the prospec- 

 tive mother must state whom she has decided to have 

 to attend her at her confinement, whether it is to be 

 a doctor, midwife, or an official from the maternity 

 hospital or maternity department of a general 

 hospital. Failure to make intimation of pregnancy 

 must be dealt with, but I would here bring forward 

 a suggestion made by my friend Dr. Chalmers. It 

 is to this effect, that the Insurance Commissioners 

 might be asked to insist that maternity benefit would 

 be sacrificed by those who failed to notify their 

 condition by the sixth or seventh month of preg- 

 nancy. Of course provision would require to be 

 made for the exceptional cases in which intimation 

 of pregnancy was impossible. 



Apart from the intimation of pregnancy the Public 

 Health Authorities need not exercise any supervision 

 over the women who elect to be attended by a 

 medical practitioner. They will include women of 

 the so-called upper middle and more prosperous 

 working classes. What we must legislate for is the 

 poorer members of the community who elect to be 

 attended by midwives or the officials of a maternity 

 hospital or maternity department of a general 

 hospital. 



