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The second case was a young girl, aged seven years, who had
never been immunised. She was admitted to hospital with a sore
throat and abdominal pain. Her symptoms cleared up quickly with
treatment and she was discharged free from infection in seven
weeks. At the hospital, throat cultures showed a mitis strain
of diphtheria which was proved virulent by guinea-pig inoculation.
All family contacts were examined and found to be negative, and
no further cases occurred in the family or at the patient's school.
Diphtheria immunisation work, commenced by the Council in
1934, was continued by the London County Council during the year.
A summary of the work carried out in Kensington is as follows:-
Number of pre-school children immunised 1,504
" " school " " 217
" " re-inforcing injections given 854
" " children attending for pre-Schick
tests 420
" which gave a positive reaction 305
" " " " negative " 73
" of children attending for post-Schick
tests 840
" proving negative 807
" proving positive 8
" who failed to attend for reading 67
Enteric fever
During the year, there were four cases of paratyphoid B
fever and three of typhoid fever. All the patients concerned
were admitted to hospital for treatment and no deaths occurred.
The four cases of paratyphoid B fever comprised all the
members of a Kensington family (father, mother and two daughters
aged three years and eight months respectively). In spite of
thorough investigations, including the bacteriological examination
of specimens from known contacts, nothing was found to suggest the
source of infection. Unfortunately, there was a delay on the
part of the patients in seeking medical advice after the onset
of symptoms so the task of accumulating evidence was made
difficult. As none of the patients had been abroad, one
possibility seemed to be that the mother had been a carrier who
had infected the other members of the family. However,
sufficient bacteriological work was not done to confirm this
nor was the problem of the mother's original source of infection
resolved.
The first case of typhoid fever was a Jugo-Slavian boy
aged fourteen years who was taken ill on his way from his own
country to join his father in Rochdale. On arrival in London,
he was already ill and he was taken to a Kensington address for
a few hours before admission to hospital. The source of
infection in this case was clearly abroad.
The second case was a woman aged fifty years, and enquiries
indicated that the source of infection was probably a party held
some time prior to onset in another part of London. Subsequent
investigations showed that a number of cases had occurred in
various parts of London as a result of the same focus of
infection. Specimens were examined from Kensington contacts,
who were kept under surveillance, and no further cases occurred.
The last case occurred in a woman aged seventy-seven years
who was living in a hostel for old people. The absence of
severe symptoms and a scrutiny of her past history suggested
that she was, in fact, a carrier, and to some extent the
bacteriological evidence supported this belief. At the end of
the year, the patient was still in hospital undergoing treatment
to eradicate the carrier state. The considerable number of