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Local Government Board, whose report has usually been made
public. Occurrences of Cerebro-spinal Fever have also been
observed in Scotland and in Ireland. There is indeed, as
will appear later, reason for belief that this disease is even less
uncommon in this country than the foregoing particulars would
seem to indicate."
The late Mr. Netten Radcliffe defined Cerebro-Spinal Fever as
"an acute, epidemic disease, characterised by profound
disturbances of the central nervous system, indicated at the
onset chiefly by shivering, intense headache or vertigo, or both,
and persistent vomiting: subsequently by delirium, often violent,
alternating with somnolence or a state of apathy or stupor: an
acutely painful condition with spasm—sometimes tetanoid—of
certain groups of muscles, especially the posterior muscles of
the neck, occasioning retraction of the head; and an increased
sensitiveness of the surface of the body. Throughout the
disease there is marked depression of the vital powers; not
unfrequently collapse: and in its course an eruption of vesicles,
petechial, or purpuric spots, or mottling of the skin, is apt to
occur. If the disease tend to recovery, the symptoms gradually
subside without any critical phenomena, and convalescence is
protracted: if to a fatal termination, death is almost invariably
preceded by coma. After death the enveloping membranes of
the brain and spinal cord are found in a morbid state, of which
the most notable signs are engorgement of the blood vessels,
usually excessive, and an effusion of sero-purulent matter into
the meshes of the pia mater and beneath the arachnoid."
A copy of the Memorandum in extenso was sent to each Medical
Practitioner in the Borough.