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14
deaths.
The corrected totals of deaths for the years 1894—1903 will be found in Table II.
Appendix. The rates for each year are not included in this Report; but the following
statement compares last year's rates with the mean rates for the preceding decennium:—

The reduction of the Borough Rate from 15.41 (decennial mean) to 13.71 implies a saving
of 250 lives; but if each Registration Sub-District be taken separately, the total number of
lives saved during the year in the whole Borough will be found to be 200.*
In Table 14 will be found the death-rates for 1904 in the Metropolis, and the five
districts immediately adjacent to the Borough, with the mean rates for 1901—3 for comparison.
Table 15 sets the local rates in comparison with those for the whole country, and those for
the groups of towns used by the Registrar-General in his Reports. In all cases the
comparison is one favourable to the Borough.
The comparison of rates based on the populations at all ages is defective, in that it
takes no count of the influences due to variable mortality peculiar to each age of life and to
each sex. This defect can be remedied by the use of "factors" obtained from the
experience of mortality at each age of life in the whole country. Certain of these factors are
available in the Reports of the Registrar-General and the Medical Officer of Health of the
County; but the factors for the sub-divisions of the Borough have been calculated by the
Department. The "corrected" rates (as distinguished from the "nett") will be found in
Table 16. The first column of that table gives the "standard rate," i.e., the rate which
would be recorded were the mortality of the residents of the district at each age of life
exactly equal to the corresponding mortality recorded in the whole country (England and
Wales) during 1891—1900. The salubrity of a district is more or less indicated by the
(negative) difference between the "standard" and "corrected" rates. The exceptional
appearance of the sign "+" in the table is, therefore, a very satisfactory feature.
*It is interesting to note that the decline in the birth-rate represents an almost equal deficiency in added
lives. Applying the reduction in the rate to the population of the Borough as a whole, the loss last year works out
at 245 lives; but the sum of the deficiencies in the three Registration Sub-Districts amounted to 262 lives.