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
St Pancras 1881
[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for St. Pancras, Metropolitan Borough]
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85
In all institutions, but those of the Workhouse and the
Central Sick Asylum Board I have been able to ascertain the
locality from which the sick person was removed, but although
I have had the cordial co-operation of the Medical Officers of
these institutions, and of the Relieving Officers of St. Pancras
I have been unable to refer back to the districts to which they
belong a very considerable proportion of the deaths of St.
Pancras parishioners occurring in these institutions. The
difficulties are caused solely by the system of book-keeping
adopted, and I would recommend the Vestry to urge upon the
Local Government Board, who control the form of books
kept, the urgent necessity of adopting a form which will
enable the Vestry to obtain information of the utmost importance
to them as a Sanitary Authority.
If the deaths of all persons in public instituions were excluded and only those deaths included which occurred in private houses, the following table would then show the rate of mortality for every 1000 of the population in the different districts:—
| All Diseases. | Tubercular Diseases. | Pulmonary Diseases other than Phthisis. | Zymotic Diseases.1 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Regent's Park | 15.7 | 1.8 | 2.4 | 2.9 |
| Tottenham Court Rd. | 15.7 | 1.9 | 2.9 | 8.0 |
| Gray's Inn Road | 18.4 | 2.8 | 3.2 | 8.2 |
| Somers Town | 19.2 | 2.0 | 3.8 | 3.6 |
| Camden Town | 16.0 | 1.7 | 4.1 | 2.4 |
| Kentish Town | 16.0 | 1.6 | 3.2 | 8.2 |
So far as these Tables may be trusted, Somers Town and
Gray's Inn Road have suffered more heavily from all classes
of disease except the pulmonary, and with the exception of
the Camden Town district both the Somers Town and Gray's
Inn Road districts have a higher rate of mortality from
this class of disease than any of the other districts.
It must be borne in mind that these figures are (with the
exception of the column of Zymotis diseases) only of use for
the purposes of the comparison of one sub-district with
* In this column the deaths from the seven principal Zymotic Diseases
occurring in Public Institutions, have been referred back to the Districts
to which they belong.