Antall József szerk.: Orvostörténeti közlemények 66-68. (Budapest, 1973)

TANULMÁNYOK - Bugyi Balázs: Az iparegészségügy kezdetei Magyarországon (1928-ig) (angol nyelven)

accident hazard, from ignorance of the staffs in such places about elementary points of first-aid and from the absence of any accident safety provision. In his capacity as university professor of surgery, with the model of a traumatic surgery under his control in the Rókus Hospital, then again as member and later as vice-president of the National Council for Public Health, he uses all his influence to make it compulsory for every factory to hold a first-aid kit and equipment, and to keep it in repair, ready for use at any moment. He is taking efforts to launch instruction courses for making the practical knowledge of first-aid spread as widely as possible; to make larger factories employ fulltime first-aid wardens; and to see that a locality or service for first-aid purposes be installed and maintained in every factory, ready for use in case of emergency at every hour of service. By intermediary of the Public Health Council, Lumniczer strove to have a provision included in the Hungarian Factory Act to the effect that the plant owner be obliged to fit the machines with safety devices and protective casings so as to make production go without accidents. Although the Public Health Council has neither shown a sufficient measure of understanding for his efforts nor attached too much importance to them, still the part remains outstanding that professor Lumniczer played in the passing of labour safety provisions. Elementary regulations for the employment of juvenile labour are contained in Act XVII of 1840 (§ 0). During the period of absolutism after defeat of the War of Liberty, there was in Hungarian legislature an entire standstill, leaving such fields as social welfare and labour protection without legal regulation or any other authoritative provision. The first Industry Code of Hungary dates from 1872 (Act VIII), with supplements and amendments laid down in Act XVII of the year 1884. Hungary's pattern of state at that time was still marked essentially by elements of feudalism; but capitalism already started to make rapid progress and a rising layer of burghers clamoured for a faster pace of modern industrial development. The implied aim of the Industry Act was to promote the growth of industry in the hands of capitalist proprietors, without making allowance —in no matter what meagre form—for the labour protection outlook. Act XVII of 1884 (§ 12) authorizes the Minister of Agriculture, Trade and Commerce to institute inquiries by his appointed inspectors in "industrial plants" which come under the force of the Industry Code; but control was usually limited to seeing whether the particular establishment complies or not with the requirements set for trade development. Points of labour protection were not made the object of supervision. Worth to note in this context is the provision of the law that an "industrial plant" was liable to supervision so far as it: a) was working with a power machine (or machines) b) employed more than 20 workers c) was registered in a separate list for the health damaging type of labour performed in it. Accordingly the majority of small-scale manufacturing plants (coming under neither of the just quoted three definitions) evaded even the most careless or superficial form of control; but precisely these were in the habit of employing