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5
The total deaths registered numbered 5,213, giving an annual
death-rate of 19.5 (18.0) per 1,000. This death-rate is corrected for
sex and population, the actual recorded rate being 18.3 (16.7).
These deaths were 619 in excess of the number registered in
1898, and 727 in excess of those registered in 1897. In arriving at
the total of 5,213 deaths, 303 deaths of West Ham inhabitants in
public institutions in London have been included (Appendix, page 80),
while 91 deaths occurring in West Ham in persons not belonging
thereto have been deducted. The annual death-rate, 19.5, was higher
than that recorded during the three previous years, but in this respect
West Ham is not peculiar, as the year 1899 was in many of the
larger towns remarkable for excessive mortality from Diphtheria and
Diarrhœa. The death-rate of England and Wales was 18'3, while that
for Registration London was 21.0.
Taking in review the past 16 years and dividing it into two periods
of eight years, 1884 to 1891 and 1892 to 1899, it will be found that
the average death-rates of the two periods were 19.5 and 19.0
respectively. This shows a margin on the right side of only 0'5 per
1,000, no great sanitary advance, but not altogether unsatisfactory
when it is remembered that the population has practically doubled
itself since the year 1884 when there were certainly not more than
150,000 inhabitants.