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turbance might legitimately be looked on as a poison to that person,
the fact that it is only the exceptional person who reacts in this
way removes this reaction from the sphere of public health interest.
The purpose underlying the notification is for the public health
department to get to know of those substances which cause reactions
not in the susceptible individual alone but in a high proportion of
those partaking of them.
Eleven notifications of food poisoning were received in the last
three months of the year. In three instances the person notified
who suffered from some gastro-intestinal disturbance was the only
member of the household affected. Three members of one family
—a mother and her two children—were suddenly ill with vomiting
and diarrhoea and raised temperature, but no incriminating foodstuff
could be traced. In another family four members, all of whom
partook of tinned salmon, succumbed about the same time to a
gastro-intestinal disturbance, while the remaining two members of
the family who abstained from the dish remained unaffected. The
last case notified was that of a child ; in this case liver was the
suspected foodstuff, other members of the family who ate this foodstuff
being similarly affected.
ERYSIPELAS.
45 cases of erysipelas were notified during the year. The sexes
were almost equally affected. The face was the region in about
two-thirds of the cases, the leg being the only other commonly
affected site. One-half of the cases were treated at home, most of
of the remainder being admitted to isolation hospitals, only a few
being treated in general hospitals. One case proved fatal, that of
a man of 72 whose arm was affected.
EPIDEMIC DISEASES OF THE CENTRAL NERVOUS
SYSTEM.
Cerebro-spinal Fever.
Five patients were notified as suffering from cerebro-spinal
fever, though one diagnosis was withdrawn in favour of tubercular
meningitis. Two infants of 3 and 4 months fell ill in January, both
cases proving fatal. In June a man of 47 succumbed to a fatal
attack. In April an infant of 4 months died of the disease, though
the case had never been notified. A further notified case was that
of a child non-resident in this district transferred from a London
hospital to the Orthopaedic Hospital and notified from there.
Acute Anterior Poliomyelitis.
Eleven cases were notified during the year, of which, however,
five were patients transferred at the outbreak of the war from one
°f the London hospitals to the Orthopaedic Hospital, Stanmore.
fhe first notified was a girl of 17, the onset of whose illness was
early April. There were no further cases till the onset of the disease