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68 Report of the Medical Officer of Health.
The chart showing the number of cases notified in each week
of the year shows two maxima in the months of October and
November. This was due chiefly to three outbreaks of the disease,
two in Wandsworth, and the other in Clapham and part in Balham.
During the year 32 cases were notified among children attending
St. Anne's School, Wandsworth, four in January, two in
February, 11 in March,three in April, seven in May, one in June,
one in September, two in October, and one in December.
The greatest number of cases occurred in March, and on
several occasions I visited the school for the purposes of ascertaining
if there was anything in the condition of the school which
would account for the excessive prevalence of Diphtheria. The
Infants Department was chiefly affected, but personal infection in
school did not seem to be causing the spread of the disease, as in
only a few cases did the children affected sit near one another.
The children attending this school all come from a circumscribed
locality, and there were ample opportunities of infection other
than in school hours. There are no open spaces in this locality,
and the children after school hours play in the streets, and several
cases were infected in this way.
Of the 32 cases only one proved fatal.
In none of the other schools in the district was there any
outbreak of the disease, with the exception of two, one in the
Swaffield Road Board School, Wandsworth, and one in Cavendish
Road Board School, in the parish of Clapham.
The outbreak in the parish of Wandsworth occurred chiefly
in the Springfield Ward, and was confined to children attending
Swaffield Road Board School.
This school is a large one and had, up to this outbreak, been
very free from infectious disease, and especially Diphtheria, but in
October and November 34 cases were notified among children
attending the school. 25 of the cases were females, and only nine
males. The first case was notified on the 9th October, the child
having been at school last on the 3rd. This case, although the
first notified, was not the first actual case, but it was not till the 27th