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16
Twenty-four of the patients were under five years of age.
Towards the end of the year posters were distributed for exhibition
calling attention to the efficacy of Antitoxin treatment. The
posters were of foolscap size and read as follows :—
DIPHTHERIA.
The Greenwich Borough Council wish to bring to the notice of
all parents and guardians of children, the vital necessity of getting
medical advice at once, in all cases of sore throat and discharge from
the nose, as such symptoms are often the signs of an attack of
Diphtheria.
Diphtheria is a deadly disease if allowed to get a firm hold of the
sufferer, but medical science has provided an almost certain cure
(known as Antitoxin) if this is used in the very early stages of the
disease.
Any case of sore throat and discharge from the nose should
therefore be seen at once by a doctor and Antitoxin administered if
necessary. By doing so you may save your child's life. If specimens
have been taken for examination do not put off seeing the
doctor because the result has not come through.
The Borough Council are doing everything possible in the
matter by providing Antitoxin for the use of medical men and paying
for examination of specimens.
Ernest George Annis,
Medical Officer of Health.
Public Health Department,
Borough Hall,
Royal Hill, S.E. 10.
Typhoid Fever.—There were no deaths ascribed as due to
this disease ; there was 1 in 1921, 2 in 1920, 2 in 1919, and 4 in 1918.
Diarrhœa, Dysentery, and Zymotic Enteritis.—Two deaths
were said to be due to these causes, equalling a rate of 01 per 1,000.
Last year there were 27 deaths and 37, 28, and 22 respectively in
1918, 1919 and 1920. One almost feels that this paragraph ought
to be printed in large leaded type on account of its unusually gratifying
character, because these two deaths were of people of advanced
ages and there were no deaths whatever from this most fatal of
infantile ailments amongst the infantile population.