View report page

35
INFECTIOUS DISEASES.
1.—Notifiable Diseases.
Under the Compulsory Notification Clauses of the Public Health
(London) Act, 1891, and the Orders and Regulations made thereunder,
3,311 cases of infectious diseases (excluding tuberculosis)
were reported, including encephalitis lethargica 7, malaria 5, acute
primary pneumonia 295, acute influenzal pneumonia 203, cerebrospinal
fever 7*, anterior poliomyelitis 7, ophthalmia neonatorum
55, measles 940, and German measles 133. These 3,311 cases
occurred in 3,010 infected houses and, of the 3.311 cases, 1,851,
i.e., 55.9 per cent., were removed to hospital, and 1,460, i.e., 44.1
per cent., remained under treatment in their homes. If the recentlyadded
notifiable diseases be excluded so as to make the 1927 figures
strictly comparable with those for previous years, the percentage of
ordinary infectious diseases cases removed to hospital during 1927
was 91.4 as compared with 91.8 for the quinquennium 1921-25,
and 85.0, 82.8, 82.8, 67.9, 54.7, and 31.5 for the six quinquennia
1916-20, 1911-15, 1906-10, 1901-5, 1896-1900 and 1891-5, respectively,
i.e., since the compulsory notification of infectious diseases
came into force under the Public Health (London) Act, 1891—a
satisfactory record.
Full statistics of all the compulsorily-notifiable infectious
diseases are to be found in tabular form.
Smallpox.
Several suspected cases of smallpox were reported, but, on
being visited by the Medical Officer of Health, the persons were
found not to be suffering from the disease suspected. No single
case of smallpox was, officially, notified during 1927.
Scarlet Fever.
Scarlet fever is always present, and the reason for this is the
mildness of some of the cases—so mild, indeed, in clinical symptoms,
as not to need, in the opinion of parents and relations, the services
of a medical man. The case mortality is very small—0.15 per cent.
(1 death out of 659 cases notified). This mildness of type and
smallness of case-mortality may be the result of the systematic
removals of patients to hospitals for isolation and treatment therein ;
or, of course, it may be simply epidemiological or cyclical in its
manifestations, the result of epidemic waves of mildness or virulence
over long periods or intervals. Whichever explanation be correct,
sanitary authorities will be inclined to adopt the former view and
* Including 1 case of post-basic meningitis.
C1