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13
It is not merely the duty of sanitary authorities to endeavour to prevent
what is known as the Zymotic Diseases, Scarlet Fever, Measles, Diphtheria,
Smallpox. Enteric Fever, Typhus, Plague and the like, but it is their duty also
to endeavour to check and control all diseases which are controllable by
preventive or sanitary measures. The Government clearly recognise this, and
the Local Government Board have everywhere allowed the payment of fees to
medical men for notifying tubercular phthisis.
THE MONEY LOSS THROUGH CONSUMPTION.
It is not possible to gauge with any degree of accuracy the amount of
money annually lost through illness from Consumption, but when it is
recollected that it is most prevalent at the period of life when man possesses his
greatest physical and mental power, and is, therefore, more easily able to
earn his maximum wages, it must indeed be very great. In Islington we have
seen that 9½ per cent. of all the deaths are caused through Phthisis, while 30T
per cent, of all persons dying occurred between the ages of 15 to 25 ; 35'5 per
cent, between 25 to 35; 28.5 per cent. between 35 to 45; and 17T per cent.
between 45 and 55 (vide chart).
Last year in the Workhouse Infirmary of this borough 125 out of 654
deaths, or 19.1 per cent. were due to Consumption, most of them in adult life,
so that locally the monetary loss must be considerable.
Dr. Herman Biggs, Health Officer, of New York, has calculated that the
annual loss through the disease in the United States amounts to £66,000,000,
arriving at this conclusion by estimating the value of each life at the average
age at which deaths from Phthisis occur at £300. This gives a total value to
the lives lost annually (150,000) of £45,000,000. To this must be added the
loss arising from incapacity for work during illness, lasting on an average nine
months, and the loss of service at one dollar a day, with food, nursing,
medicines, attendance, etc., at one and a-half dollars a day, which result in
a further loss of £21,000,000. For the City of New York the loss is £4,600,000
per annum.
On the basis of Dt. Bigg's estimate, the annual loss in London would
amount to £3,300,000, and in Islington to £240,000. It is a reasonable proceeding
to estimate a man's life at £300, for it represents the cost of his
rearing, his education, his training to a trade, business or profession, all of