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VITAL STATISTICS.
The summary of vital statistics on page 12 seems to confirm
that the post.war fillip in the birth rate is already beginning
to peter out, as it did following the last war. In fact the raised
birth rate following the present war has not been so well
sustained as last time. It may well be that the acuteness of
the housing problem has been a contributory factor. It is
perhaps of interest that the birth rate for Merton and Morden
has fallen more steeply than the other rates shewn in the
table. The live birth rate for England and Wales has fallen
from 20.5 to 17.9, the 126 great towns from 23.3 to 20.0, the
148 smaller towns from 22.2 to 19.2 and the London Administrative
County from 22.7 to 20.1, while the rate for Merton and
Morden has fallen from 17.86 to 14.45.
It will be seen that the infant mortality rate for Merton and
Morden is 24.8 per 1,000 compared with 31 per 1,000 for
London and 34 for England and Wales as a whole and that
deaths from diarrhoea under 2 years of age are less than half
that of any of the others. This is a gratifying figure as it is
always regarded to some extent as one of the yardsticks whereby
the sanitary conditions of areas can be compared. One of the
Australian delegates at a recent conference said that he would take a
great deal of pride in having his city described as a good place in
which to bring children up. We need not, therefore, apologise
for drawing attention to this figure, one of the few statistical
proofs of what would otherwise have to remain a matter of faith.
It may be observed that the table also shows that we have
the highest rate for some of the infectious diseases, for example,
whooping cough and measles, but we are compensated, to some
extent, by the fact that our death rate from whooping cough is
as low as the lowest. In this connection it should be, perhaps,
borne in mind that measles and whooping cough are diseases
in which the doctor is not always called in and the extent to
which this occurs still varies in certain areas, so that the
number of measles and whooping cough notifications may be a
more reliable guide as to the standard of parental care rather
than of the actual incidence of the disease.
Our still.birth rate once more is the lowest shewn in the
table, 0.27 per 1,000, as compared with 0.42 per 1,000 for
England and Wales as a whole, or, in simpler terms, 36% better.
This figure is closely associated with those factors affecting the
welfare of the mother both during pregnancy and during
labour and further, closely follows the trend of the maternal
mortality figure, which, for the year under review is nil.
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