A history of the school medical services and child health in Australia 1900-1939

In the early twentieth century in Australia, health and hygiene were considered by the medical profession to be of the utmost importance for a nation. Government medical doctors recognised that, in creating a healthier generation, their claim for new knowledge would best success based on scientific discoveries, and was therefore vital. Private medicate practitioners, as members of the medical profession, shared the concern for the future of the nation: the development of school medical services was allowed in a controlled way. The child was identified to be at risk from physical and mental defects and specific childhood problems, which were perceived to be affecting attendance and performance at school. Government primary schools were introduced to the concepts of health and hygiene, as part of a compulsory health strategy, through a scientific model of efficiency. The strategy focused on numerous areas of health including physical and mental defects, anthropometrical studies, nutritional values, physical education requirements, school environment standards and child health research. School medical officers through the strategy gained control of child health. Goals were set and Australian children were identified, as the generation in the eugenic sense, and would be a healthier, stronger and more intellectually developed people for the nation. The need was for the youth of Australia for the war effort, and work production during the economic depression, and influenced the health developments in school. This provided a momentum for the school medical officers and the medical profession to further the notion of preventive health. It required stringent regulations in the school for conditions for learning. To highlight these activities the study will demonstrate a Foucauldian argument where strategies for surveillance for maintaining control are central. Standards for all aspects of health and hygiene became essential. School medical officers sought recognition and control, and provided a platform for clinical expertise in child health. The medical profession also claimed the role as an authoritative health body whilst the psychologist, dentist, nurse and social worker contributed to the health professional role, and emerged as experts in their own field. These developments had a far-reaching effect in the school, home and the community. The study will attempt to demonstrate how medical doctors, from 1900 until 1939, used government primary school systems to highlight the problems affecting the school child. School health in Australia was directly and indirectly assisted by English precedents to develop standards for child health. During this period the emergence of a professional health group assisted Australian school medical officers to introduce health and hygiene into the school and the community. A team effort was essential to address a range of health problems. Yet, for school medical officers social efficiency was the key to their success or failure, and can be measured in the establishment of a medical curative model.