London's Pulse: Medical Officer of Health reports 1848-1972
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Hints from the Health Department. Leaflet from the archive of the Society of Medical Officers of Health. Credit: Wellcome Collection, London
Hornsey 1904
[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for Hornsey, Borough of]
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| Year. | Number of deaths from consumption of the lungs. | Death rate per 1,000 persons living from consumption of the lungs. | Death rate per 1.000 persons living from all tubercular diseases. | Total deaths from the 7 principal zymotic diseases, viz. :--Diphtheria, Scarlet Fever. Diarrhoea, Whooping Cough, E iteric Fever, Measles, and Small Pox. | Death rate per 1,000 persons living, from the 7 principal zymotic diseases, viz.:— Diphtheria, Scarlet Fever, Diarrhoea, Whooping Cough, Enteric Fever, Measles, and Small Pox. |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1904 | 54 | 653 | 914 | 69 | 819 |
| 1903 | 46 | 591 | 842 | 48 | 613 |
| 1902 | 45 | .595 | 886 | 33 | 436 |
| 1901 | 45 | 612 | 857 | 40 | 544 |
| 1900 | 87 | 525 | 688 | 52 | 738 |
| 1899 | 56 | .828 | 65 | 961 | |
| 1898 | 36 | 556 | 52 | 803 | |
| 1897 | 43 | 694 | 64 | 1.036 | |
| 1896 | 30 | 527 | 58 | 985 | |
| 1895 | 43 | 769 | — | 60 | 1.073 |
| 1894 | 40 | 768 | 58 | 1.095 | |
| 1893 | 35 | 700 | 47 | 938 |
The death-rate from Phthisis, and from all forms of Tuberculosis,
is shown in the above table, side by side with the total
death-rate from the seven principal zymotic diseases.
It will be seen that tuberculosis is more deadly than all the
commoner infectious diseases put together, and that in 1901 and
1902 the deaths from Consumption of the lungs alone exceeded in
number the deaths from the seven principal zymotic diseases.
Among infectious diseases, tuberculosis is the disease about
which our knowledge is greatest, and therefore the disease towards
the prevention of which most ought to be accomplished.
In the case of the commonest form of tuberculosis, consumption
of the lungs, it has been shown that infection is spread by the
dissemination of minute particles of sputum during the acts of
coughing or speaking, and by spitting under conditions which
favour the drying of the sputum, and its subsequent pulverisation
and dispersion in the air.