London's Pulse: Medical Officer of Health reports 1848-1972

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Camberwell 1893

Thirty-eighth annual report of the Vestry...

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notified cases was that of a medical student. I saw him
professionally and learnt that a case or two of small-pox
presented themselves as out-patients at the hospital at
which he was a student. The cases were at once recognised;
but pending their removal to the Asylums Board Hospital,
they were naturally seen by several of the students, of
whom some two or three (including my patient) contracted
the disease. In the fourth place it is interesting to note
that a young girl contracted small-pox from insisting on
kissing her sweetheart previous to removal to hospital with
the disease. In the fifth place to show how easily the
disease may be spread, I may call attention to the fact that
a man was notified in our parish and sent to hospital, who
had travelled all the way from Newcastle to London with
the rash upon him. The sixth case is of a somewhat
similar character. The bare details of the cases are given
under Nos. 142, 143, 144, 148 and 149 in the table.
Dr. Stevens has mentioned that one case had occurred and
not been recognised. Several other cases followed and
were notified, and as they all refused to be removed to
hospital Dr. Stevens and I made a point of visiting the
premises. The house was occupied by two families, the
mother of each family being the main sufferers. We
endeavoured to persuade them to go to hospital, but
fruitlessly. We heard, however, that the husband of one
of them was in the house, and asked to see him. When he
came down he had evidently just returned from work, for
his face and hands were thickly grimed with coal-dust.
I went up to speak to him, and found him covered with smallpox
rash of some days' standing; and I learnt from him
that he had been going to his work daily, ever since he was