London's Pulse: Medical Officer of Health reports 1848-1972

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Greenwich 1856

[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for Greenwich District]

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REPORT.
TO THE GREENWICH DISTRICT BOARD OF WORKS.
Gentlemen,
Your Board requires that your Medical Officer shall
furnish you with an Annual Report, wherein he shall give a
retrospect of the health of the District; and also enter into a
detailed account of the proceedings that have been carried on
during the time that your jurisdiction over this District has been
established ; and, according to one of your Bye-laws, it is further
required, that such Report shall be presented on the last Wednesday
in the month of May. I therefore beg to lay before you all the information
on the different subjects that I have been enabled to collect.
In order that I may be enabled to compare the Sanitary
condition of the District with that of former years, I propose only
to render you an account of the mortality and sickness during the
year ending the 27th of December, 1856.
It is a great gratification to me to be enabled to state, that the
mortality of the District during that period has been considerably
below the average of previous years.

The deaths occurring in the District during the seven preceding years were in the following numbers, viz.:—

No. of Deaths.
In the year 18492,534 (Cholera year)
„ 18501,615
„ 18511,818
„ 18521,854
„ 18531,985
„ 18542,526 (Cholera year)
„ 18552,025
„ 18561,897.

From which statement you will perceive, that in the year 1849 the
deaths reached a maximum of 2,534. In the year 1850 the deaths
were reduced to 1,615, which large reduction, in all probability,