A North Wales Experiment in Subnormality Care

The philosophy behind subnormality care is clearly to prevent subnormal functioning. This involves eugenic aspects, adequate obstetric and pre-natal care, paediatric diagnosis, and remedying inherited and acquired handicaps. It is common knowledge that much of the functional subnormality once seen among adults can be avoided with good community facilities. A recent team of American experts touring the U.S.S.R. reluctantly concluded that, by means of good obstetric and child care facilities, the U.S.S.R. probably avoided the hospitalization of some half the number of those who in the U.S. were found to need residential care (Kety, 1965). Craft and Miles reviewed Welsh facilities in the 1960's, and found that some of the areas reviewed apparently labelled three times as many persons ‘subnormal’ as others, thereby producing a residential hospital solution to many difficult social problems.