The Commonwealth Government, under an agreement with the University of Sydney, established a School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine at the University in 1930, for the purpose of training medical graduates and students in the subjects of Public Health and Tropical Medicine. The School initially offered units in preventive medicine, tropical medicine, bacteriology and pathology, biochemistry, medical entomology and parasitology, and expanded to include industrial health, vital statistics, environmental health, molecular biology and nutrition. In 1980 the School's name was changed to the Commonwealth Institute of Health (CA 3156).
 
The School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine was opened on 4 March 1930 by the then Federal Director-General of Health, Dr J.H. Cumpston. The organisation of the Australian Institute of Tropical Medicine at Townsville (CA 522) was merged into the new school, and the staff and more specialized equipment and material were transferred to Sydney. The School initially employed a staff of 13, which grew to a final staff size of 106.   Records of the Institute of Tropical Medicine at Townsville were transferred to the School in 1930 and these records, along with those of the School itself, are held by Australian Archives, New South Wales Branch.
 
The idea of creating such a school arose as early as 1925 when the Royal Commission on Health drew attention to the lack of training facilities for postgraduate courses in the different fields of Health administration. Following discussions in 1926 between the Commonwealth and State Ministers for Health it was recommended that the Commonwealth Government should consult the various medical schools and universities of the States with a view to the establishment of a School of Preventive Medicine. On 15 November 1927 an agreement between the Commonwealth and the University of Sydney provided the basis for establishment of the School, with the University providing a site and the Commonwealth agreeing to erect the School.
 
The work of the Commonwealth Advisory Council on Nutrition, from 1936 to 1938, was centred at the School, and included extensive compilation of statistical data secured during surveys and the chemical analysis of foodstuffs. In 1935 the second International Pacific Health Conference was also held at the School.
 
The functions of the School were to provide post-graduate training for the Diplomas offered by the school; provide fifth-year
undergraduate training in certain subjects; provide various courses of instruction for doctors, health workers, nurses and others; advise on tropical hygiene, industrial medicine and child health; provide consultative practice in connection with the previous functions; provide library service and films; conduct analytical examinations for the A.C.T.; train Health Laboratories personnel; conduct basic and laboratory research; carry out field research in the tropics; provide consultative pathological services for Health Laboratories and tropical territories.
 
The School conferred 293 Diplomas of Public Health, 350 Diplomas of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, 38 Diplomas of Occupational Health, and 188 of Nutrition and Dietetics.
 
The Directors (or Principals) of the School (also Professors of Preventative Medicine at the University of Sydney) were: Harvey SUTTON (who took office in 1930), Sir Edward FORD (1947), R.K. MACPHERSON (1968), and Lindsay DAVIDSON (1977).
 
The School progressively expanded its role and shifted emphasis from treatment and disease prevention to the more positive approach of health promotion and self-help in health maintenance. The need to formalize the School's expanded role was recognized in June 1975 by a Committee of Review chaired by Dr. Sidney Sax. The Committee
recommended doubling the School's resources and numerous other sweeping changes. These recommendations were supported by a further report, that of the Task Force on Co-ordination in Welfare and Health (the Bailey Report) in 1976. In May 1979 the Government, after first referring the recommendations to the Tertiary Education Commission (which endorsed them), gave its approval in principle to the changes.  

The School was officially closed on 3 March 1980 by the then Minister for Health, the Hon. Michael Mackellar who immediately renamed the School the Commonwealth Institute of Health (CA 3156).
 
SOURCE - "School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine Closes: Commonwealth Institute of Health Opens" : Press Statement by the Minister for Health, No 10/80, 3 March 1980
 

Historical agency address
University of Sydney, Building A27, Fisher Road, Sydney NSW