Page:Gódávari.djvu/177

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PUBLIC HEALTH.
151

obtained there from the irrigation canals, which are liable to pollution. The water-works recently constructed in Cocanada municipality are referred to in Chapter XIV.

The public medical institutions in the district comprise seven hospitals and seventeen dispensaries. Of these, two hospitals and a dispensary are maintained by the municipalities, and the rest by the local boards. Statistics regarding all of them will be found in the separate Appendix to this volume.

Besides the above, the missions maintain several medical institutions. The American Lutheran Mission at Rajahmundry keeps up a dispensary for women and children in which some 3,000 cases are treated annually. Connected with the dispensary is a small hospital, and the erection of a larger one has been resolved upon. The Canadian Baptist Mission manages, and in part maintains, the Kellock Home for lepers at Rámachandrapuram, which was founded in 1899 by the liberality of Mrs. Kellock, the widow of Dr. Kellock, a Canadian Baptist. At the end of 1904 the patients attending it numbered 94. It contains three large wards for men and a smaller one for women, and is owned, and largely supported, by the Mission to Lepers in the East. At a distance of a mile from it, is the Phillips Memorial Home for the untainted children of the lepers, which was erected from the subscriptions of the children attending Sunday schools in Great Britain in memory of the first Secretary of the Indian Sunday School Union. The Canadian Baptist Mission also has a dispensary at Rámachandrapuram, and is erecting at Pithápuram a hospital to contain 21 beds.

The medical institutions in Cocanada town comprise a hospital, a branch dispensary and a dispensary for women and children.

The first of these is situated in the suburb of Jagannáthapuram. It was founded in 1856 and has 32 beds for male, and 14 for female, patients; in the out-patient department is a room with six beds set apart for Europeans. The main block is well ventilated and lighted; but there are no caste, or special contagious, wards. The hospital is jointly maintained from Provincial, local, and municipal funds. It is in charge of a Commissioned Medical Officer aided by an Assistant Surgeon and two hospital assistants, and is under the general control of the municipal council.

The branch dispensary in the same town was founded in 1888 and is maintained by the municipality. It treats over 20,000 patients annually. The building, was erected in memory of M.R.Ry. Kommireddi Narasinga Rao by his son.