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132
8. Total number of Certificates for the year 1931 of
successful primary vaccination of which copies
have been sent to Vaccination Officers of other
districts
167
Whooping Cough.
This disease is not compulsorily notifiable in Hampstead, our
principal source of information of the occurrence of cases is the Head
Heachers of Schools. During 1932, no case proved fatal.
Tuberculosis.
In Hampstead, as elsewhere, the incidence of and mortality from
tuberculosis have shewn a steady decline in recent years. This has
been obtained as a result of a combination of circumstances, chief
amongst which are the concerted efforts of the public tuberculosis
services, the better housing and nutrition of the working classes and
the apparent increased immunity to infection of the surviving community
as a whole.
Probably the greatest and gravest problem with which the Tuberculosis
Service is faced to-day is the supervision and care of the highly
infectious advanced case. This type of patient having failed to
respond to sanatorium treatment, and for various reasons unsuitable
for further detention in hospital, returns to an overcrowded home,
depleted in the necessities of life, and of a necessity only too often
becomes a menace to the other members of the household. The
Tuberculosis Medical Officer (A. J. Scott Pinchin, M.D., F.R.C.P.)
in his report points out that "we are no nearer a satisfactory solution
for the care of the advanced case."
The accompanying graph shews that, apart from the war years
of 1915-1918, Hampstead continues to have an incidence and mortality
from tuberculosis commendably lower than both the Metropolis
and England and Wales as a whole. The 10 years from 1913 to 1923
shewed a marked reduction in the incidence of tuberculosis from 5.0
to 1.8 per 1,000 of the population; although the incidence has naturally
not declined to the same degree there is still a steady decline to
the figure of 1.0 per 1,000 of population for the year 1932.