The Hospital At War Time

During the years of the Second World War very little information was given about the hospital. It is known locally that soldiers were treated in the isolation hospital but dates and times of these patients were very vague. There could be a number of reasons why this occurred here are some of them. 1) Many were at war including local doctors and councillors and newspaper reporters, these men were the ones who would have kept the records up to date. 2) Newspapers focused on the World War, so little information was given on the local hospitals. These are two of the many reasons why I think very little information can be found during the War years. The information that was given did not explain how the hospital was run during times of war or if things such as rationing or the shortage of medicines affected medical care.

It would be 1940 before the next report was recorded in the Medical Health Officers report when a typhoid fever epidemic occurred in the Borough. Some of the patients were treated in Badsley Moor. Nurses who came into contact with the typhoid patients were immunised at a cost of 2s 6d per injection. To try to reduce the increasing typhoid fever epidemic, the public health committee authorised free anti-typhoid vaccine to general practitioners to immunise the residents of the Rotherham Borough. By the end of 1942 there had been 49 bottles of 25 CCs of T.A.B.C. vaccines had been issued by the department. In all 466 people were vaccinated against the typhoid fever. Over the next few years information lapsed again until a scarlet fever outbreak in 1943, where in a matter of no time 272 cases were diagnosed, of which 179 were admitted in to Badsley. Throughout the year only one death occurred, this was not from scarlet fever but from bronchial pneumonia.

Badsley Moor Lane Hospital in 1995 The building had needed some alteration and improvement work on it for a number of years but owing to the war good trade men were hard to find. Fears about the war was not the only thing on the minds of the hospital staff. The existence of louse borne typhus fever in Europe and North Africa made it advisable to take precautions in case the disease reached this country. It was necessary to provide protective clothing for the use of nursing staff, doctors, ambulance drivers, etc. These people would be the ones dealing with the cases of Typhus fever should the necessity for the need arise. Early in 1943 a scheme of mutual aid was agreed upon where the isolation hospital would be used for the care of typhus fever patients if the need arose.

By 1943 a nation wide immunisation program for patients with diphtheria began. Locally there had been 66 cases reported in Rotherham. It was slowly realised that immunisation was the only way to protect the community. When a high percentage of the community is protected, the disease could not spread. Immunisation was the only way forward so an intensive campaign was needed to explain the benefits of this to the public at large. The immunisation program seemed to pay off by 1944 diphtheria had been reduced to 48 cases. The figures for 1945 were 24 cases, the lowest number of diphtheria cases in the Borough for twenty years. Only one death had occurred in the last three years from diphtheria, and this patient had not been immunised. Since October 1942 diphtheria immunisation was free to all children within the Borough through their medical practitioners.

As May 1945 came, it brought the end to the Second World War and with the celebrations came time for peace and reflection. This year like many before, scarlet fever was the greatest infectious disease treated in the hospital with a total of 173 cases throughout the year. One of the patients was a member of staff who caught the disease while caring for the sick. Since 1937 no deaths had occurred in the Borough from scarlet fever and councillors reinforced the idea that a good hospital mixed with a good standard of nursing care worked. During the past five years (1940-1945) it is noteworthy that 1,218 cases of scarlet fever had been treated at the hospital and no deaths had occurred. As this disease seemed now to be the most treatable the hospitalisation of scarlet fever was discontinued. Priority was given to patients with measles, whooping cough, etc. 1,155 cases of whooping cough resulting in 22 deaths occurred, and in the same period 6,406 cases of measles resulting in 7 deaths occurred. From this year no patients were treated for scarlet fever in the hospital, it was now treated at home unless a patient's condition was so bad that they would need hospital care. The scarlet fever block would now be used to support measles or whooping cough patients if these diseases reached epidemic proportions. Lots of fresh air was often advised by the medical profession. Homes and hospitals alike should be well ventilated. However in the towns the air was rarely fresh therefore people were not surprisingly in the habit of opening their windows. Ignorance was not confined to the benefits of air and sunlight. Working class families often found it difficult to afford fruit and vegetables and had no idea such food would be better for them than their usual diet of bread and jam, fish and chips and tea. Although consumption of nutritious food had increased since the end of the war, half the nation was still living on an inadequate diet. Poor living arrangements and inadequate diets highlighted the need to educate the public in these matters as part of the fight to reduce all infectious diseases.

Advertisement of special campaigns to emphasise the importance of immunisations appeared in local press; by posters and shop-window displays, and a film on diphtheria immunisation was shown at local cinemas. During 1946 the number of cases notified to the hospital had slightly increased from the previous year. The 33 cases were all adults over 15 years old including 6 nurses and 5 patients already at the hospital. This slight increase in no way reflected on the success of the two-part immunisation campaign. This special publicity that started in June and July was a concentrated effort to immunise school children and again in August and September where this time the attention was on pre-school children. Senior schools were given special talks and the parents of every school child were issued with a letter advising immunisation. Although there had been a slight increases of diphtheria no deaths occurred. By 1947 diphtheria cases dropped to only 8, none of these had received a course of immunisation. Seven of these patients were nursed at the Isolation Hospital and one was nursed at home.

Children with polio were treated at Badsley, 8 children suffering acute polio myelitis were transferred to the Adela Shaw Orthopedic Hospital, Kirby, for orthopedic treatment. It was arranged by Dr. Crockatt, the Corporation’s specialist who after visiting the patients at Badsley would monitor their progress once they had gone to Kirby. One child suffering from acute polio-encephalitis died at the hospital after only eight days of treatment in the same year of 1947.

The NHS 1946 Act After the war many people demanded better health care. By 1936 the national health insurance covered half the population, although it did not extend either to dependants or the self-employed or the unemployed. Men and woman had given their lives to make this a better nation and they demanded better conditions then they had before the war. This was just as well as other pressure brought many changes to the future health care.

As Minister of Health after 1945 Aneurin Bevan set out to implement this recommendation in the 1946 National Health Service Act. Opposition came from the doctors and the British Medical Association. Like Bevan the doctor wanted a national health service but they wanted to protect their own interests. Doctors feared they would become salaried state officials and lose their independence. This conflict with doctors lasted into the 5th July 1948 when the new National Health Service was established.

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