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30
SMALLPOX.

Calculated by the Department.
SMALLPOX.
No case of smallpox has been recorded in the Borough since 1906. In the Metropolis 4
cases were reported during the past year, as compared with 5 in 1912, and 72 in 1911.
Of the 4 cases reported last year, 3 were subsequently found to have been erroneously
diagnosed. Complete returns of the notifications in the extra-metropolitan sanitary areas are
available for the three years 1911-13. (See Table 19.) The number of cases reported in each
year has declined from 193 in 1911 to 87 in 1913. Nothing is known as to the proportions of
cases reported which have been erroneously diagnosed. The cases discovered on inspection of
ships in home ports numbered 25 last year, as compared with 12 in 1912 and 30 in 1911. The
majority of such cases would have acted as centres for the spread of the disease in the country
had they not been held up at the ports.
Vaccination.—Table 27, compiled from information supplied annually by the Vaccination
Officer, continues to demonstrate the increasing neglect of this most valuable protective. The
proportion of infants surviving to their first birthday without being vaccinated has increased
from ll'O per cent, in 1901 to 22'4 per cent, in 1912 (the last year for which complete returns are
available), equal to an increase of over 100 per cent. The increase in the numbers of children
in respect of whom exemption was taken out under the Vaccination Act, first observed in the
returns for 1908, shows no signs of abatement. Doubtless it will be argued that the continued
freedom from smallpox at present enjoyed by the country at large renders vaccination unnecessary,
and that, should occasion arise, the majority of those at present unprotected would
hasten to cover their risk. The natural reply to such arguments is that no one knows when he
may unknowingly come into contact with the disease, and that it is, therefore, sheer folly to
neglect to cover a risk which cannot be foreseen. Moreover, to delay seeking vaccination until
the occasion arises involves a strong probability of finding that the covering of the risk has been
undertaken too late, and, further, there is a real danger of vaccination when done under the