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Disinfections.—During the year 396 rooms and 4,287 articles of bedding,
clothing, etc., were disinfected after various infectious diseases.
Cleansing of Persons Act.—During the year 194 persons (187 men and 7
women) infested with vermin had their bodies and 3,100 articles of clothing disinfected,
free of charge, at our cleansing stations at the Public Mortuary, Goldsmith
Street.
Tuberculosis.
Tnberculosis Notifications.
By the Public Health (Tuberculosis) Regulations, 1912, the notification of all
forms of Tuberculosis was made compulsory.
Excluding duplicates and military and naval cases the total number of notifications
received was 123, of which 26 were private cases, 73 hospital cases, and 24
poor-law cases. Of these 111 were pulmonary cases and 12 non-pulmonary.
Of the total number of cases 14, or 11.3 per cent., were residents of common
lodging houses, and were all at once or soon afterwards removed to workhouse
infirmaries. With few exceptions the remaining 109 lived in tenement houses, and
38 of these were removed to infirmary or hospital, 71 remaining at home, but some
of these had previously been in infirmaries, hospitals or sanatoria.
Some practitioners do not notify cases until tubercle bacilli have been found in
the sputum, and a number of cases are not notified until shortly before death.
The number of deaths from phthisis during the year was 45, or a death-rate of
1.13 per 1,000, in comparison with 1.76 for 1919.
During the past year of the 45 deaths, 8 had been removed to infirmaries from
common lodging houses in the Borough, that is about 17.7 per cent.
Tuberculosis Dispensary.—Since February, 1915, the Council has made
arrangements with the University College Hospital, conjointly with South St. Pancras,
for dealing with cases of tuberculosis, including contacts, both insured and uninsured.