Rise and Development of Sanitary and Hygienic Surveillance in Pediatric Hygiene: Celebrating the Centenary of the Russian Sanitary and Epidemiological Service

Abstract

Introduction: Information about the rise and development of the system of sanitary inspection in institutions for children and adolescents is scattered and scarce in scientific publications. This fact has determined the purpose of the study to analyze the history of the Russian sanitary surveillance in pediatric hygiene in the 19th to 21st centuries. Materials and methods: We analyzed scientific papers and historical sources, including government and departmental regulations and guidelines, reviews, works of hygienists published in 1936–2021 and related to the formation of the system of sanitary inspection and providing for safe conditions in institutions for children and teenagers. Of more than 150 papers reviewed, we selected 31 sources found eligible for inclusion. Results: School doctors were the first to conduct sanitary surveillance at the end of the 19th century. In the early 20th century, school health organizations, and later the departments of the municipal health bureaus, solved a wide range of tasks, including those of hygiene, pediatrics, and epidemiology. At the stage of formation, sanitary inspection was carried out in close contact with teachers and specialists from related branches. After the revolution, the absence of the national sanitary legislation was replenished by government acts enforcing hygienic standards important for protecting health of the child population. The improvement and update of the regulatory framework, forms and methods of sanitary control in children’s institutions became feasible in the early 1960s owing to the intensive development of pediatric hygiene as a scientific discipline. Conclusion: Priority tasks of surveillance in children’s institutions varied depending on socio-economic realities, infectious and general disease rates, changes in education, and the development of related branches of hygiene, epidemiology, pedagogy, construction industry, and jurisprudence. This was accompanied by elaboration and improvement of the legislative framework, forms and methods of sanitary control and inspection of children’s institutions. The emergence of new health risk factors for the child population requires appropriate control and surveillance activities enabling a timely response to contemporary challenges.