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47 [1902

MEASLES.
One of the most satisfactory returns was that from Measles, for whereas
for seventeen years the average had been 206 deaths, the number registered
during the year was only 114, or a decrease of 92. The death-rate arising
from these deaths was only 0.33 per 1,000, as compared with a rate of 0.46 in
the Encircling Boroughs, and 0.51 in London.
The Medical Officer has often called attention to the fact that Measles
in itself is not a particularly fell disease, but that it is the complications
which so frequently arise during its course, or during the convalescent period,
which are so fatal. The present returns are no exception to those of previous
years, for he finds that in every one of the 114 deaths a secondary cause was
ascribed for the fatal result. Thus Pneumonia intervened in 70 instances, and
Bronchitis in 20. Whooping Cough complicated 4 of the cases and Convulsions
5, besides which there were other complications which are fully set out
in Table XXXV. It is, however, to the cases in which Pneumonia and
Bronchitis were the secondary causes that attention is particularly drawn,
for it is to them that death was really due. It is not too much to say that
the majority of the deaths would never have occurred if only reasonable