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To the Mayor, Aldermen and Councillors of the Metropolitan Borough
of Lewisham.
Mr. Mayor, Ladies and Gentlemen,
I submit herewith my report for the health department for the year
1953.
The Registrar General's estimate of the population in midyear 1953
at 225,800 was 1,300 less than his estimate for midyear 1952. The
prewar estimated total population in June, 1939 was 231,000. The crude
birthrate for the year at 14.4 shows an increase of 0.5 from the figure
of 13.9 for the previous year, but the adjusted birthrate (allowing for
age and sex distribution of the population) is only 0.3 higher, at 13.4.
The crude death rate at 11.1 shows a small decrease from the 11.4 of
last year, and the adjusted death rate, also 11.4, compares with 12.5
for the administrative county. The infant mortality rate at 22 was the
same as in the previous year, the neonatal rate (i.e., under one month
of age) and the one month to one year rate both remaining constant.
The stillbirth rate again increased, this time fairly steeply, from 17.7
to 23.5, and this is disquieting ; it is the highest rate since 1943. The
combined stillbirth and infant death rate (reproductive wastage) therefore
goes up, from 40 to 45. One maternal death again occurred and so
the maternal mortality rate per thousand live and stillbirths remains at
0.3. The premature birth rate, i.e., the number of children weighing
5½lbs. or less at birth per thousand livebirths, is not so exact a figure,
as a few babies who were for one reason or other not weighed at birth
have been regarded as premature (this is probably true but not necessarily
so). The rate for 1953 at 75 is a little down on the previous year.
The various comparative figures of general statistics since 1901 are
shown in table 12.
Tuberculosis
The number of new notifications again increased, from 307 to 341,
the notification rate rising from 1.35 to 1.51. The number of deaths
from tuberculosis showed a slight rise, from 42 to 48. In 1953 in
Lewisham there were 34 male deaths and 14 female ; the corresponding
figures for the previous year were 28 and 14, while for the two years
1937-8 the combined figures were 169 males and 153 females. The
increasing male preponderance therefore continues.
Maternity and child welfare
There was very little variation in the principal rates other than the
stillbirth rate. The immovability of the neonatal rate with at the same
time the increase in the stillbirth rate are both somewhat vexatious
factors, allied as they may be to nutrition. An analysis of the neonatal
deaths indicates that 8 of the 53 were due to congenital deformities,
7 to injury at birth, 11 to asphyxia or lack of expansion of the lungs
at birth, and 20 (against 17 last year) to prematurity or immaturity.