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The births occurring every year in Kensington have fallen in round numbers from 4,500 in
1880, to 3,070 in the present year. The steady decline in the birth-rate is shown in Table V.
Appendix, p. 53, where the number of births and the birth-rates both for London and Kensington
are given for each quinquennial period since 1881. The figures for each year were given in the
Annual Report for 1908.
Illegitimate Births. —The illegitimate births numbered 136, and were equivalent to a rate
of 8 per 10,000 persons living.
Notification of Births. —The Notification of Births Act, 1907, requires every birth to be
notified within 36 hours to the Medical Officer of Health, either by the father of the child or by
some person in attendance upon the mother in her confinement, and applies to still-born children as
well as to children who are born alive. Out of the 2,888 live births registered as having occurred
in Kensington, 2,627 or 91 per cent. were notified to the Medical Officer of Health. The unnotified
births accordingly amounted to 261, or 9 per cent. of the number registered during the year.
The subjoined figures show that 2,892 births in all were notified.
Source of Notification.
Number of Births Notified.
Still Births.
Live Births.
Total Births.
Midwives
38
1,489
1,527
Parents
379
384
5
Medical Practitioners
634
667
33
Other Persons
125
125
Births in the Borough
2,627
2,703
76
Institutions outside the Borough
3
189
186
Total
2,813
2,892
79
Of the notifications received 186 were forwarded by the London County Council, and related
to infants born of Kensington mothers in Queen Charlotte's Hospital or other Institutions beyond
the Borough.