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in some measure effected during the previous year; but it is with
equal regret that I now have to announce to you, that a very
large increased mortality has taken place amongst children under
the age of 10 years during the past year. In 1857, the deaths
under 10 years of ago amounted to 692; but in 1858 they numbered 810, being an increase of 118 over the previous year, and
making two-fifths of the whole number of deaths that have taken
place at all ages. In the same Table you will observe that the
increased mortality for the past year has arisen principally, as I
before remarked, from Epidemic and Chest Affections, to which
classes of disease we are chiefly to refer for the purpose of obtaining
a correct knowledge of the sanitary state of every neighbourhood;
for although science has not yet pointed out to us that the prevention of these diseases is within the power of man, still it is an
acknowledged principle, to be borne in mind by all persons having
the direction of sanitary matters, that the mortality arising from
that class of disease is very much, if not almost entirely, under
human control. Take, for example, Typhus Fever. It has been
already shown, in some of my former Reports, that filth and deficient
ventilation tend much to aggravate all Epidemic Diseases, but more
especially do they operate in the spread of the contagion of Typhus
Fever; and I have also remarked, that whilst it often affects the
whole members or a large proportion of a family amongst the lower
orders, it rarely spreads in the same manner amongst the better
classes of society, who attend more to cleanliness and ventilation.
I have also pointed out that an amelioration of the condition of the
lower orders in those particulars, would, as the changes were
effected, diminish their chances of catching contagion, and would
not only operate in directly lessening its diffusion, but, by reducing
the number of its sources, would tend to diminish the actual
quantity of this morbific principle that might be generated in a
given time.
The Registrar-General, in his Quarterly Return, October 28th,
particularly adverts to the City of Ely as an example of the salutary
effects of simple sanitary measures. He points out that during the
seven years (1843-1849) before the Public Health Act was brought
into operation, the mortality was at the rate of 26 deaths annually
c