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11
County Borough of Croydon.
REPORT
OF THE
MEDICAL OFFICER OF HEALTH.
For the Year 1914.
Section A.—VITAL STATISTICS.
THE POPULATION at the Census of igoi was 133,895, and
had increased at the Census of 1911 to 169,551, of whom 77,059
were males and 92,492 were females.
The population at the middle of 1914 according to the mode of
estimation which has been employed for a very considerable period
now was 181,956. It is this population upon which all the rates
have" been calculated throughout the report.
The Registrar General, however, has introduced a new method
of calculation, and according to this his estimate of the population
of the Borough for 1914 is 178,511. This latter figure has not
been taken in this report, firstly, because the estimated population
of 1911 was verv close indeed to that revealed by actual enumeration
at the census, and there is in the existing circumstances in the
Borough no evidence that the rate of increase of population has
shewn any alteration. The method employed, therefore, in the
intercensal period (1901-n) would appear to be that which would
give the most accurate result in the case of the County Borough of
Croydon. Further, I have estimated the population upon the basis
of the number of inhabited houses at June, 1914, giving the result
of 185,935, an estimate which comes very close to that made by
the method already in use. An estimate based upon the number
of children attending the Council Schools as compared with the
number attending during the various years of the past decennium
also gives a figure considerably higher than that of the Registrar
General's new method. To accept the new estimate made by the
Registrar General would therefore be to work upon a basis which
is not only probably less accurate for the particular case of Croydon
(although there is no doubt that it will apply more accurately to the
country as a whole and to other local districts) it would give a
wrong impression of the vital statistics of the district controlled by
the local authority here.