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enteric fever, 1); St. Mary's Hospital, 3 (diphtheria, 2;
diarrhata, 1); London Fever Hospital, 1 (scarlet fever)
Northern Hospital, 1 (scarlet fever); Station Hospital, Vauxhall-bridge-road,
I (scarlet fever); Victoria Hospital for
Children, 1 (diphtheria); Children's Hospital, Great Ormondestreet,
1 (diphtheria); Miller Hospital, 1 (entericfever); and
St. Pelagio's Creche, 1 (diarrhea).
UNCERTIFIED DEATHS.
Two deaths only were not certified either by a registered
medical practitioner or by a coroner. They were of
a newly-born child, information of the death having been
given by a midwife, and of a man, aged 57, the cause of whose
death, ascertained by post-mortem examination, was heart
disease. The cases were reported to the coroner who did not
deem it necessary to hold inquisition. In England and Wales
the deaths not certified were 2.0 per cent. of total deaths;
the proportion in London was 0.0 and in Kensington, 0.07
per cent.
The great towns which had the largest proportion of
uncertified deaths, were West Ham 2.7 ; Sheffield 2.8 ; Preston
and Birmingham 32 ; and Liverpool 3.4 per cent.
The subject of uncertified deaths was considered, in the
session of 1893, by a Select Committee of the House of
Commons, appointed " to inquire into the sufficiency of the
existing law as to the disposal of the dead, for securing an
accurate record of the causes of death in all cases, and
especially for detecting them when death may have been due
to poison, violence, or criminal neglect." The recommendations
of the Committee were summed up in ten paragraphs, of
which it is only necessary to cite the first two, as follows :—
(1) " That in no case should a death be registered without production of a
certificate of the cause of death, signed by a registered medical
practitioner, or by a coroner after inquest.
(2) 11 That in each sanitary district a registeied medical practitioner should be
appointed, as public medical certifier of the cause of death, in cases in
which a certificate from a medical practitioner in attendance is not
forthcoming."