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6
PREFACE
The health of the Borough of Lambeth during the year 1947 has
been generally satisfactory as is borne out by the statistics in the
report. The Registrar General's estimate of the population at the
mid-year was 223,670, nearly 14,000 more than the estimated
population in mid-1946, and 2,380 more than the number of
holders of ration books at the end of 1946. The birth rate was
23.10, compared with 22.89 in the previous year, which was then
the highest recorded for over twenty years and the infantile
mortality of 32 is three lower than last year and is now the lowest
recorded. The maternal mortality is a little higher, 1.51.
The old people suffered rather more than is usual in the winter
owing to the abnormal weather in the first quarter. Influenza,
bronchitis and pneumonia, the trio responsible for so many deaths
in the aged and infirm, are always more in evidence during the
winter months and particularly during cold weather when
associated with fog. Fog in London is invariably laden with the
irritating acrid fumes caused by the burning of raw coal in open
domestic fireplaces. When numbering the restrictions imposed
upon so many of the daily activities of life, it is a source of
surprise that there is none upon the burning of raw coal in the
open grate of a dwelling house which can foul the air, which all
must breathe, to any extent without let or hindrance. The fouling
of the two other principal necessaries, food and water, is an
offence but, strangely enough, not the fouling of air. The extent
of the fouling can be gauged from the rate at which soot is
deposited in Archbishop's Park, which is by some 30-40 tons per
square mile each month. From the 1st January to the 5th April,
1947, deaths in London from the trio numbered 3,686 compared
with 1,715 for the corresponding period in 1948, and but for the
shortage of coal might well have been much higher. The death
rate from all causes, however, was 13.04, but little higher than the
previous year's 12.87, as the fine weather of the summer and
autumn more than offset that experienced in the first four months.
It was becoming more and more difficult for would-be householders
to gain a foothold in the district in spite of the repair of
damaged property and the erection of new houses, but still
people managed to squeeze themselves in. Quite a number of
instances occurred of a furnished room being taken by the father
fpr himself and subsequently bringing the mother and several
children to join him. The serious overcrowding thus caused had