View report page

No lymph is used if there is the slightest cause for doubt
as to its purity.
Further, vaccination is carried out nowadays with
aseptic precautions.
In all cases of primary vaccination the vaccinator should
aim at procuring four good-sized vesicles, in order to obtain
the maximum result, and the total area of vesiculation should
not be less than half a square inch.
Diphtheria.
During the year this disease was very prevalent in
Camberwell, the notifications numbering 875. Of these 860
were removed to isolation hospitals.
Although the number of cases notified is high, yet
the death rate from diphtheria has remained more or less
stationary, there being 72 deaths.

It is possible to reduce the death rate from diphtheria
by the early administration of anti-toxin and the incidence
of the disease by the practice of inoculating toxin and
anti-toxin.
Progress in the direction of active immunisation, however,
is slow.
Health propaganda and the education of the public in
the value of such prophylaxis should, in time, bear fruit,
and result in the eager acceptance of this agency for the
protection of children against diphtheria, with its accompanying
mortality. The extreme prevalence of this disease
is probably due to a large extent to "carrier cases."
It is known that virulent diphtheria bacilli may be
present in large numbers in the throat and nose of an
individual without there being any clinical symptoms of the
disease present. It can be understood that cases of this type
are a distinct menace to the health of the community as a
whole, and it requires no further comment to demonstrate
the importance of the adoption of means which would prevent
the spread of this disease, particularly in a Borough like
Camberwell, with its densely populated areas.
Until something is done on these lines it is doubtful
whether any appreciable decrease in the number of cases of
diphtheria can be looked for.