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THE THIRTY-EIGHTH
ANNUAL REPORT
OF THE
MEDICAL OFFICER OF HEALTH,
For the Year 1893.
To the Vestry of the
Hamlet of Mile End Old Town.
Gentlemen,
It now becomes my duty as your Medical Officer of Health
after the close of the year 1893 to report to you on the sanitary
condition of the district, and in doing so, I may state that
numerous improvements have been effected in the various parts
of the Hamlet, both in construction and reconstruction of the
drainage system to private houses, and also in improving the
various sanitary conveniences which are requisite and form part
of all premises, by substituting modern appliances in lieu of
those which were of out-of-date pattern, and remedying other
matters that were found to be nuisances within the meaning of
the Public Health Act. The Public Health Act of 1891,
although somewhat complicated, is of a very stringent character,
and there is ample power in it and the bye-laws which are made
by its order for a sanitary authority to remedy any nuisance
which is of such a character so as to be dangerous or injurious
to health.
POPULATION.
In what is termed the intercensal periods, it is necessary for the
purpose of Statistics, that the population of any district should
be as accurately estimated as possible; a simple way would be
to add the excess of the births over the deaths, this would be
the "Natural Increase of Population," but past experience has
taught us, that in our own district, these figures would be very
misleading. I find that the best system to adopt is to estimate
the population by logarithms; it is by this method that the
Registrar General bases his calculations, and by these means, I