London's Pulse: Medical Officer of Health reports 1848-1972
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Hints from the Health Department. Leaflet from the archive of the Society of Medical Officers of Health. Credit: Wellcome Collection, London
Kensington 1901
Annual report on the health, sanitary condition, etc., etc., of the Royal Borough of Kensington for the year 1901
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47
A number of other boroughs, by local Acts, have obtained powers similar to those of Liverpool.
The Public Health Committee of the County Council, iu their report (4th July), stated
that the great difficulty hitherto experienced in seeking powers, had been as regards registration,
Committees of Parliament having rejected provisions requiring registration, apparently for the
reason that such registration would apply to confectioners, hotels, &c.; no sufficiently
precise definition of the particular class of ice cream, with which it was intended to deal,
having been formulated. The Committee, therefore, suggested that it would suffice, for all
practical purposes, if the itinerant vendor of ice creams were required to exhibit on his
barrow a notice showing the name and address of the person from whom he obtained his supply ;
and they limited their proposals for legislation to the Liverpool provisions, plus this requirement.
They were of opinion, moreover, that the provisions of legislation should be administered by the
Borough Councils.
The County Council adopted the report of the Committee, and their proposals were embodied
in a General Powers Bill introduced during the current session of Parliament.
NOTIFICATION OF INFECTIOUS DISEASE.
The tables at pages 48-50 show (1) the number of notifications in London in 1901; (2) the relative
prevalence of the several diseases at different periods of the year, in Kensington and in London ;
(3) the notifications in the wards, &c., of the Borough, and (4) the case-rate and the death-rate
of infectious diseases in Kensington, 1891-1901. The Kensington notifications were 1,025; viz.,
in the Town sub-district 840, and in Brompton 185. The notifications in the ten preceding years
were 787, 1,182, 1,811, 972, 1,289, 1,781, 1,457, 1,004, 1,046, and 986 respectively. Table XIV.
(appendix, p. 116) shows the streets, &c., where cases of the scheduled diseases occurred in 1901.
The cases notified in London, 40,361, were 5,057 more than in 1900. Ihe notifications of each of the scheduled diseases during the twelve years, 1890-1901, are set out in the subjoined table—
| Year. | Small-pox. | Scarlet Fever. | Diphtheria. | Enteric Fever. | Typhus Fever. | Other Continued Fevers. | Puerperal Fever. | Erysipelas. | Croup. | Cholera. | Relapsing Fever. | Total. |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1890 | 60 | 15,330 | 5,870 | 2,877 | 85 | 237 | 206 | 4,598 | 550 | 25 | 7 | 29,795 |
| 1891 | 114 | 11,398 | 5,907 | 3,372 | 27 | 152 | 221 | 4,764 | 505 | 23 | 39 | 26,522 |
| 1892 | 423 | 27,096 | 7,791 | 2,465 | 20 | 147 | 347 | 6,984 | 565 | 54 | 7 | 45,849 |
| 1893 | 2,813 | 36,901 | 13,026 | 3,663 | 22 | 205 | 897 | 9,700 | 668 | 86 | 4 | 67,485 |
| 1894 | 1,192 | 18,440 | 10,655 | 3,360 | 21 | 162 | 253 | 6,080 | 535 | 21 | 2 | 40,925 |
| 1895 | 978 | 19,757 | 10,772 | 3,506 | 14 | 105 | 236 | 5,660 | 451 | 29 | 3 | 41,511 |
| 1896 | 225 | 25,638 | 13,361 | 3,189 | 6 | 102 | 278 | 6,438 | 446 | 13 | 3 | 49,699 |
| 1897 | 105 | 22,876 | 12,811 | 8,113 | 4 | 65 | 264 | 5,801 | 388 | 38 | 1 | 45,465 |
| 1898 | 85 | 16,917 | 11,561 | 3,032 | 17 | 55 | 250 | 5,180 | 310 | 23 | — | 37,380 |
| 1899 | 29 | 18,112 | 13,363 | 4,460 | 14 | 69 | 829 | 5,615 | 338 | 15 | — | 42,344 |
| 1900 | 87 | 13,812 | 11,788 | 4,809 | 7 | 73 | 237 | 4,776 | 210 | 5 | — | 35,304 |
| 1901 | 1,702 | 18,387 | 11,967 | 3,193 | 20 | 48 | 250 | 4,604 | 187 | 3 | — | 40,361 |
Plague was made notifiable by the Local Government Board in 1901; but no case of the
disease occurred in the metropolis.