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

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Hampstead 1893

Report on the sanitary condition of the Parish of St. John, Hampstead for the year 1893

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been an excess, the loss has been more than compensated
for by the diminution in Measles and Whooping
Cough.
Small-Pox.—This disease became epidemic in London
during the early spring, being spread by means of tramps
coming from the Northern Counties and Midlands, who
appear to have infected a large number of workhouses and
common lodging-houses.
After enjoying an almost complete immunity from smallpox
for many years, we have now to record the occurrence of
12 cases of this disease in this Parish during 189 J. The two
first cases occurred in April within a day or two of each
other. In one instance, the gentleman attacked had been
attending a Night School for lads; and in the other, that
of a tramp, aged 40, who was admitted to the Casual Ward
of the Workhouse on April 7, after passing a night on the
Heath, and who had previously been sleeping in various outhouses
and sheds. It seemed to be clearly established that
he had passed one night in the Salvation Army Shelter,
Blackfriars Road—a centre of infection at that time to which
many cases were subsequently traced.
The fatal cases were those of an unvaccinated infant, aged
one month, and a domestic servant, aged 26, removed to the
Hospital Ship, Atlas.
The arrangements of the Asylums Board for the conveyance
and treatment of small-pox patients are as follows:—
The cases are collected by a special branch of the Board's
Ambulance Service and brought either to Poplar or
Rotherhithe, at each of which places there is a wharf
provided with examination and waiting-rooms, &c. By