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62
SCARLET FEVER.
Scarlet Fever has prevailed considerably in excess of what
has been experienced in recent years. There were reported
altogether 637 cases during the year, yielding a notification rate
of 4.5 per 1,000 persons living in Willesden, a rate slightly in
excess of the mean for the whole period since it was made
notifiable.
At no time could it be said that the disease assumed the
proportions of an epidemic, but throughout the year and in all
parts of the district it prevailed in greater degree than usual.
What Sydenham described as the " epidemic constitution of the
year," may for lack of more precise knowledge of the conditions
be said to have favoured the spread of Scarlet Fever, and but
for the prompt and extensive hospital isolation of the cases, I have
no doubt we should have experienced a sharp epidemic of the
disease.