8

The so-called New Criminal Section, completed in 1924, re-
mained empty for many years, but the increase of staff has made it
possible to occupy it during 1928. It is a forbidding looking
section, built on strictly orthodox Jail lines, and is greatly inferior
in every way to the New Female Hospital mentioned above.

The Committee is considering the question of dismantling
some of the older, more obsolete, and insanitary structures, and
replacing them with up-to-date and hygienic Hospital wards for
general and specialised forms of therapy. The existing Male Hos-
pital is so badlyl ighted and ventilated that it is impossible satisfac-
torily to treat the large number of cases of pneumonia and other
acute diseases which carry off so many mental patients each year.

The accommodation for attendants has always been very re-
stricted and it is urgently necessary that an extension should be
made to the staff quarters. A temporary chappared barrack was
built towards the end of 1929 and has been occupied by a number
of unmarried male attendants.

IV. Sanitation.—During the triennium, a water-carriage
system has been installed on the female side of the institution and
this has been working most satisfactorily, in spite of the fact that
the motor pumps which carry the sewage and sullage to the
gardens are not of the right type. When these are changed, the
sanitation of this part of the institution will be still further im-
proved. It is very important that a similar system should be
installed on the male side, as, even with the greatest supervision,
it is not possible to prevent the inmates from drinking the efflu-
ent in the open drains which continue to run throughout the
Male Mental Hospital

A point which must especially be stressed in connection with
the water-carriage system in the Female Mental Hospital is the
enormous decrease in the death-rate. During the first ten months
of 1929, only eleven female patients died, the average death-rate
over the last six years being 24 per annum. Most unfortunately,
however, a severe outbreak of influenza occurred in November
and December, which carried off a large number of patients. Some
died from the disease itself, but a greater number succumbed to
other more chronic illnesses to which this complication was added
in a comparatively mild form, which ought not ordinarily to have
proved fatal.

A considerable amount of correspondence has been carried
out on the subject of the Mian Mir Storm Water Drain. Each
annual report contains reference to the extremely insanitary
affairs in the heart of the Hospital. Every monthly report calls
attention to this disgrace on civilisation. From the earliest
triennial report of the Punjab Lunatic Asylum published in 1903