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Paratyphoid Fever
A 19 years old Islington housewife attending a hospital outside the Borough had
been investigated for abdominal pains and diarrhoea, and a Widal test showed a high
titre of paratyphoid *B' . Neither she nor her husband were employed in the food trade
and they had no family. Domiciliary enquiries were made and bacteriological examination
of contacts proved negative.
Notifications were received from an Infectious Diseases Hospital which referred to
a mother aged 25 years and daughter aged 2 years living in the Borough. It was reported
that whilst all cultures of faeces examined were negative, the Widal reaction showed
falling antibody titres consistent with an infection, most probably of paratyphoid fever.
In neither instance was there any suggestion of carrier state. Bacteriological
examination of residential contacts all proved negative.
In addition to the above there were three suspected typhoid cases which were
investigated, but were subsequently not confirmed.
Seven groups of Islington contacts of Typhoid and Paratyphoid Fever cases not in
the area were also followed up during the year as follows:-
Information received from the Medical Officer of Health, City of London, that the
P & 0 Liner 'Himalaya' which arrived in Tilbury on the 3rd February, landed a sick bell
boy at Marseilles, who was subsequently confirmed as a case of typhoid fever. His duties
involved the serving of coffee to passengers, and the last date of contact was the 22nd
January when the boy first reported sick. Nine passengers and crew were reported
proceeding to addresses in Islington. Domiciliary enquiries were made, but in three
instances they were not known at the address given, and the Medical Officer of Health.
City of London was advised accordingly. Bacteriological examination and surveillance of
the remainder was carried out, and their medical practitioners informed.
A rural authority outside Greater London reported that there had been a confirmed
case of typhoid fever in a patient who was on holiday at a holiday village in Majorca,
from the 29th May to the 12th June. Practitioners were asked to keep in mind the
possibility of a similar infection in patients who might present themselves, and who had
been on holiday at this village.
A total of twenty cases of typhoid fever occurred at Friern Hospital, Barnet,
during the latter part of the year. All were hospital patients and no staff were
reported affected. A total of sixty suspected contacts living in Islington were reported
to the department and were kept under routine surveillance. Bacteriological examinations
were carried out and all results proved negative.
Information was received of a confirmed case of typhoid fever who was a visitor to
Butlin's Holiday Camp, Bognor Regis. Domiciliary enquiries and bacteriological
investigations of thirty-one Islington residents who visited the camp at the same time
as the patient, and three staff who had returned home, were satisfactorily carried out,
and the medical practitioners informed.
A child who was admitted to a general hospital in Camden was subsequently diagnosed
as a case of confirmed typhoid fever. A total of eight Islington Ward contacts were
reported. Domiciliary enquiries were made and bacteriological examinations proved negative.
Two other references were for isolated contacts of cases of typhoid fever with
satisfactory conclusions.
Dysentery
There were five hundred and two cases notified and coming to knowledge' during the
year. Of these, four hundred and twenty-eight proved positive, whilst seventy-four were
clinical cases with negative stools. The source of infection was not determined in the
greater proportion of these cases, although there were minor outbreaks at several schools
in the borough.
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