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10
Principal Causes o( Death.
The death rate of 13.28 per thousand population was the highest recorded rate
in post-war years, as can be noted from the table on page 7. This was in accordance
with the general rise in the 1951 death rate for the County of London, and also a
somewhat smaller increase for the whole Country. The details of the increases are
discussed below.
Infants under one year. The infant.mprtality rate, 28 per thousand live births,
varied little from last year (29), and it is the third successive year with an infant
mortality rate of under 30. As mentioned in the Annual Report for 1950, it must
be regarded as evidence of the greatly improved personal standards of infant care
and knowledge applied by mothers. Such care appears to be more important for
infant survival than general environmental and housing conditions, which cannot
be regarded as satisfactory or as greatly improved over pre-war conditions when
the infant mortality rate was much higher. The importance of the care taken by
each mother is further demonstrated by the extraordinarily low figure of 14 for
the illegitimate death rate. The total number of illegitimate births of course is
relatively small, but the remarkable reduction in the illegitimate infant mortality
risk over the past few years has been regular and consistent, as shown in the following
table (rates per 1,000 illegitimate live births) :—
1951 14 1948 39
1950 23 1947 39
1949 35 1946 68
Of the 1951 total of 109 infant deaths, 33 occurred within twenty-four hours
of birth, and 64 within the first seven days. This is regarded as the most difficult
group in which obvious preventive measures can be taken, the principal requirements
being even greater care and medical attention during pregnancy. Of the small
balance of deaths numbering 34 which occurred during the period from one to twelve
months, 16 were due to the respiratory infections, i.e., bronchitis and pneumonia,
and all of these respiratory deaths occurred not later than the seventh month. Most,
if not all, of these deaths should be preventable without difficulty, and each such
death should therefore be regarded as an unnecessary tragedy.
Deaths from other Causes.
Respiratory Tuberculosis. Deaths from this cause continued to decrease, although
there was still a substantial group of 69. It is particularly satisfactory that the
largest decrease in the number of deaths due to tuberculosis is in the age group between
fifteen and forty-five years, with only 17 deaths as against 30 for 1950. Pulmonary
tuberculosis has always been the greatest single cause of death for this age-group
but 1951 is the first year in which this did not occur.
Malignant Growths of Lung and Bronchus. These figures were not given
separately by the Registrar Genera] prior to 1950 and it is not therefore possible to
make exact comparisons with previous years. From an investigation of the
department's records, however, it would appear that there has been a considerable
increase since 1946. It will be noted that males are affected to a very much greater
degree than females—in the proportion of more than four to one for 1951. There is
evidence that the increase is connected with the increase in heavy tobacco smoking,
particularly of cigarettes, but this may not be the only factor, and atmospheric
pollution by smoke is also under suspicion. If social factors are in part responsible