Government[NLS note: a graphic appears here - see image of page] of Madras

           LOCAL SELF-GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENT
                              PUBLIC HEALTH

          G.O. No. 1528 P.H., 11th July 1933

Report—Mental Hospitals—1932—Recorded with remarks.

READ—the following :—

Letter from Major-General C. A. SPRAWSON, C.I.E., V.H.S., I.M.S., Surgeon-General
with the Government of Madras, to the Secretary to Government, Local Self-Government
(Public Health) Department, dated 20th April 1933, No. 660-1/H.

Order—No. 1528 P.H., dated 11th July 1933.

Recorded.

2. Strength and accommodation.—The population of the
three hospitals and their daily average strength continued to
increase during the year as shown in the margin. The Mental
Hospital at Madras was responsible, as may be expected, for the
largest population 1,573, while Calicut and Waltair had a popu-
lation of 413 and 161, respectively.

With a view to relieve the overcrowding in the Mental Hospital, Madras, patients other
than criminal insanes from the districts of Madura, Ramnad, Salem and Tinnevelly are
admitted into the Mental Hospital, Calicut, and those from Chittoor are sent to the Waltair
Mental Hospital. As even this arrangement does not seem to have had the desired effect,
proposals are now under consideration to extend the Mental Hospital at Madras or to open
a new Mental Hospital at Tanjore by utilizing the buildings of the Medical School hostel.

3.   Sick rate and mortality.—The death-rate rose from 5.8 in 1931 to 6.6 in the year
under review. The daily average number of patients sick in the hospitals stood at 242 as
against 233 in the previous year. Except for a few cases of influenza of a mild type at
Madras and Calicut there were no epidemics worth mentioning.

4.  General.—Financial stringency continued to stand in the way of progress but normal
activities were carried on as usual.

          (By order of the Government, Ministry of Local Self-Government.)

                                                            E. CONRAN SMITH,
                                                        Secretary to Government.