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42
dying during the year of Whooping-cough. The Registrar
General remarks in his annual report that, " Whoopingcough
carried off many children all over London.'' In the
entire Wandsworth district this disease appears to have
been fatal during the past year in 43 cases, 9 of which
were registered in this sub-district. The cause of this
unusual fatality was doubtless the variable temperature
which marked many of the months of 1867, during which
the disease prevailed, and which was known to have led,
in numerous instances, to the supervention of Pneumonia
and other lung affections of a dangerous and fatal character.
It may be remarked that but one death due to
Whooping-cough took place in the Sub district in 1866.
The average number of deaths from this disease for 12
years is 2 only, so that the 9 deaths in the past year is a
strikingly disproportionate number.
Small Pox and Vaccination.—Of 207 infants born in
the parish in 1867, the public vaccination of 115 appears
to have been accomplished and duly registered in that
year. Hitherto it has not been possible to determine the
number of vaccinations performed by the private practitioners
of the Sub-district, since scarcely one of them have
ever furnished the required certificates ensuring the due
registration of their successful cases. The new Vacchiation
Act, which came into operation on the 1st January of the
present year (1868), will doubtless furnish, before its close,
same accurate information upon which to judge of the
necessity or otherwise of a still further amendment of the
laws relating to this most important question. It cannot
be said that the new measure has any claims to be considered
a perfect one, nor is it one likely to ensure results
that shall be entirely satisfactory to either the medical
profession or the public. It is a step, however, in the
right direction, inasmuch as it must have the effect of
causing a more general resort to vaccination than has
hitherto been the practice. The registration of every
successful case of vaccination is, by the provisions of the
new Act, supposed to be thoroughly secured ; for whether
the operation has been performed by a private practitioner