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89
22 cases were notified during the year. Of these 21 proved to be of little
moment. 1 died as a result but unfortunately the diagnosis of food poisoning
was not made until the post-mortem examination was performed and the
notification arrived after death. Bacteriological examination of the intestinal
contents showed the presence of bacillus aertryck.
The source of this bacillus was put down to some jellied eels which the
patient had eaten 10 days previously.
I could not investigate the source of the jellied eels for the shopkeeper had
apparently given up his business on the same day on which the patient visited
his shop. Luckily no similar cases came to my notice.
Thirteen cases of food poisoning in London were reported which had a
common source of possible infection, i.e., pease pudding. This pudding
had been made from dried peas which had been supplied by a well-known firm
in Stepney.
As at first the peas themselves were suspect I visited the firm, the manager of
which at once gave me a list of all persons who had been supplied with peas
from the same consignment. This list contained 238 parcels which been
sent to 50 different localities and on passing on the information to the Medical
Officers of Health of these different localities a stop was put on the sale and
consumption of the peas in those parcels.
On further investigation the cause of the food poisoning was discovered
to be due to human contamination after the pease pudding was cooked. As the
peas themselves were not the cause of the poisoning I informed the above 50
Medical Officers of Health and no doubt they released the parcels on which they
had put a stop.
3,263 rooms were fumigated and the bedding, etc., removed and
disinfected by steam. Of these 2,529 rooms were fumigated because of
infectious diesease, 191 as a result of pulmonary tuberculosis, and 543 because
they were verminous. In addition to these, scabies occurred in 406 families
and the bedding was taken away and disinfected by steam.
The disinfection of second-hand clothing, prior to export to South Africa
and the supervision of the packing of the goods was carried out as in previous
years. The number of such articles dealt with last year reached 61,162.
The total number of articles disinfected for all purposes was 98,246.
Food
Poisoning
Cleansing
and
Disinfection.