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35
Notifiable Infectious Diseases.
During 1923, under the Notification Clauses of the Public
Health (London) Act, 1891, and the Orders and Regulations made
thereunder, 3,170 cases of infectious diseases (excluding Tuberculosis)
were notified, including cerebro-spinal fever 4, acute poliomyelitis
8, encephalitis lethargica 3.
The distribution of the cases notified in the Wards and the
Sub-Districts is shown in the table on the previous page.
Excluding the cases of measles and whooping cough, there were
1,271 cases, which occurred in 1,082 infected houses. Of these
cases, 918 (i.e., 72·2 per cent.) were removed to hospital and 353
(i.e., 27·8 per cent.) remained under treatment at home.
Full particulars of all notifiable infectious diseases will be
found in the form required by the Ministry of Health in Table II.
in the Appendix.
Infectious Disease Contacts.
Many cases of "contacts," which were reported to the Medical
Officer of Health, were kept under observation in connection with
various diseases, as follows:-
Small-pox Scarlet fever
Plague Enteric fever
Diphtheria
The above include civil as well as military cases.
Small-pox.
One case of Small-pox was notified in Battersea in 1923 in the
person of a man aged 53 years, who resided in South — West Battersea.
Information was received on the 20th September from the
Medical Officer of Health of a Northern Metropolitan Borough that a
man who worked as a carman and disinfector for a firm of contractors
which carried out disinfecting work for his Sanitary
Authority was absent from his work through illness. He was
reported to have assisted in the disinfection of a room and in the
removal of bedding, &c., from a house from which a case of Small-pox
was removed to hospital on the 8th September.
On enquiries being made at his home in Battersea it was ascertained
that this man occupied two basement rooms and lived alone.
He had been at work up to the 19th September, when he consulted
his doctor,