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
Camberwell 1912
[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for Camberwell.
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I—6
inability to assist in this way. In other words, lack of means to
provide any extra or special form of nourishment is the factor that
counts before all others.
On making a detailed and comparative inspection of the certified
causes of deaths, it would appear that there is a great decrease in
those resulting from inflammatory intestinal diseases, the deaths
being 56 compared with 226, and if we take the sub-heading Diarrhœa
alone, we find that there were 116 fewer deaths. The low temperature
not only means a condition unfavourable to the growth of the
specific organisms, but it is accompanied usually by rain, which
diminishes the amount of dust and flies, the two main sources of the
probable contamination of food which induces diarrhœa in the
epidemic form.
Deaths under One Year from All Causes per 1,000 Births.
| Borough. | 1906. | 1907. | 1908. | 1909. | 1910. | 1911. | 1912. | Year in which Health Visitor was appointed. |
| Camberwell | 130 | 115 | 104 | 100 | 94 | 109 | 83 | |
| Bermondsey | 153 | 123 | 144 | 138 | 126 | 156 | 111 | 1909 |
| Bethnal Green | 155 | 138 | 132 | 129 | 123 | 151 | 96 | 1906 |
| Hammersmith | 138 | 117 | 120 | 120 | 99 | 146 | 90 | 1905 |
| Hampstead | 77 | 69 | 69 | 75 | 60 | 78 | 62 | 1909 |
| Kensington | 132 | 128 | 119 | 113 | 106 | 133 | 91 | 1906 |
| Lambeth | 131 | 120 | 104 | 109 | 94 | 123 | 86 | 1907 |
| Woolwich | 109 | 112 | 94 | 82 | 85 | 97 | 73 | 1906 |
In the class of deaths attributed to premature birth we had
less, but the deaths from infantile atrophy increased from 84 to 93.
The deaths from the various forms of tuberculosis numbered 19,
exactly the same as last year. Bronchitis and pneumonia were
both a little more fatal, while congenital syphilis caused six
more deaths than in 1911. It must be remembered that this only
represents the fatal cases and is no criterion of the number who do
not die, but who are maimed for life by its ravages. The question
of notification has never been seriously taken up, although it seems
certain that many of the worst effects of the congenital forms of
venereal diseases would be robbed of much of their malignancy were
the sufferers searched out and the parents forced to give them proper
medical attention. A somewhat similar course is followed now with
regard to the notification of ophthalmia neonatorum, and it is
unaccompanied by difficulty in administration.
There were 79 deaths from measles, compared with 107 in the
previous year. As is usually the case, they all occurred among that
age period under five of the population, 21 occurring in the first
year of life, against 29 for the same age period in 1911. In practically
all the fatal cases the immediate cause of deaths was some
form of bronchitis or pneumonia.