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7
Public Health Department,
Town Hall,
High Holborn, W.C.I.
September, 1964.
To the Mayor, Aldermen and Councillors of the
Metropolitan Borough of Holborn,
Your Worship, Ladies and Gentlemen,
I am pleased to present the Annual Report on the health and sanitary circumstances
of the Borough for 1963. For the greater part of the year Dr. G. W. Piper was the
Medical Officer of Health and the Report is consequently the record of the work which
was largely done under his direction.
The Registrar General's estimate of population for 1963 is 20,700. This is the first
time since 1932 that Holborn's population figure has shewn a natural increase, although
the figure of 60 is probably too small to have any real significance as yet. The birth
rate is the highest for the last five years, but this is offset to a certain extent by the death
rate which is the third highest for the last twelve years. As has been stated in these
reports before however, the rates are calculated from such relatively small figures that
variations from year to year mean very little.
The main causes of death fell within the usual present day pattern with diseases of
the heart and circulatory system being the commonest, and cancer the next most common
with lung cancer predominating. Holborn's infant death rate of 52.52 per 1000 live births
was as usual high compared with London and the rest of England, but this is always so,
due to the fact that deaths at the Hospital for Sick Children, of children residing outside
England and Wales are for statistical purposes credited to Holborn. There have been
no maternal deaths in Holborn since 1953.
Following an outbreak of typhoid fever at Zermatt in Switzerland a nurse working
at a hospital in the Borough and who had been on holiday at Zermatt at the time, contracted the disease and was removed to an isolation hospital. Patients in the ward where
she had worked were kept under surveillance, and Medical Officers of Health of areas
to which patients had been discharged were also notified, and those patients too were
kept under surveillance.
There were no cases of diphtheria or poliomyelitis during the year. Two cases of
food poisoning were notified, both occurring at a hospital in the Borough. Notifications
of new cases of tuberculosis, although slightly higher than last year were still within the
trend of a fall in numbers over the last ten years.
In March the Council's new minibus was put into service for the transport of aged
and handicapped persons. A suitable room in the Bathing Centre was equipped as
a chiropody clinic for old people and sessions are held there twice a week, patients being
taken to and from the clinic by minibus for one session. The Chiropodist also carries
out domiciliary treatment for the housebound elderly. The new chiropody arrangements
are very much appreciated by the old people.
With the transfer of functions to the new Borough of Camden on 1st April, 1965,
this will probably be the last Annual Report by a Holborn Medical Officer of Health
and it might be an opportune moment to compare statistics from the first Annual Report
of the Borough's Medical Officer of Health with those of its last.
In 1900 Holborn's population was 64,990, and in 1963, 20,700. The death rate was
22.4 compared with 12.17 in 1963, the birth rate 27.2 compared with 11.01, and the infant