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93
Outbreak of Diphtheria at the Royal Masonic Institute
for Girls, September to December, 1908.
An outbreak of Diphtheria occurred at the Royal Masonic
Institute for Girls, Wandsworth Common, during the months of
September, October, November, and December, 1908. The
majority of the cases notified were of a mild type, the clinical
symptoms being slight, and in one or two cases apparently absent,
but the bacteriological examinations carried out disclosed the
presence of the true Klebs-Loeffler Diphtheria bacillus in every
case.
The cases were isolated and kept under observation, and were
not allowed to mix with the other children until they were pronounced
on bacteriological evidence to be free.
The necessity of "weeding out" all these suspicious cases
was, having regard to the large number (267) of children in the
Institute, a matter of primary importance, and was only accomplished
by a systematic medical inspection and bacteriological
examination of all suspects and contacts.
The disease first started in the Junior School. A child named
Alice D— being noticed on the 28th August to be suffering
from enlarged glands in the neck. She was isolated until the
3rd September, and was then allowed to return to school
apparently recovered.
On the 7th September a child named Julia G—, a pupil in
the Junior School, was found to be suffering from a sore throat.
She was isolated and kept under treatment until Nth September,
and was then discharged apparently recovered.
The nature of these two children's illness was not suspected
to be, at the time, Diphtheria.
On the 18th September Edith L—, also a pupil in the Junior
School, complained of a sore throat. On the same date two
other children, Marjorie S— and Mary L—, were found to be
suffering from sore throats. As there appeared to be evidence
of infection taking place in the schools, swabs were taken from the