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METROPOLITAN BOROUGH OF SOUTHWARK
PUBLIC HEALTH DEPARTMENT.
WALWORTH ROAD, S.E.17.
Telephone : RODNEY 5464
To the Mayor, Aldermen and Councillors
of the Metropolitan Borough of Soutfmark.
YOUR WORSHIP, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN.
I have the honour to present the Annual Report of the Medical
Officer of Health for the year 1962.
Vital Statistics
For the first time since 1953 the Registrar General's estimate
of the population of Southward as at mid-year 1962 showed an increase,
albeit a small one, rather than a decrease, as compared with the preceding
year. In previous reports reference has been made to the annual
decrease in the number of residents due to emigration from the borough
which reached a peak some five or six years ago but of late had shown
signs of diminishing. It is to be hoped that the fall in the population
of this central London borough has now been arrested and that residential
accommodation will continue to form a large proportion of
future development.
The number of live births was 1,651, which, after application of
the comparability factor, gives a birth rate of 17.3 per 1,000 of the
population. This is only slightly less than the figure for 1961 which
was the highest birth rate experienced in Southwark since 1952, and
is only 0.7 less than the rate for England and Wales.
Another satisfactory feature of the statistics for 1962 is that
lower figures were recorded for both the infant mortality rate and the
still-birth rate, being 20.5 per 1,000 live births and 17.2 per 1,000
live and still births respectively. At 13.3 per 1,000 live births the
neo-natal mortality rate showed a slight increase, but was still less
than that for the country as a whole. Of the twenty two neo-natal deaths
twenty occurred during the first week. One death during the year was
attributed to pregnancy, childbirth or abortion. The crude general
death rate was 14.2 per 1,000 of the population, which after adjustment
for purposes of comparison falls to 11.9 per 1, 000, is very similar
to the figures for the two preceding years and to the figure for England
and Wales.
There was little change in the individual causes of death as compared
with 1961, diseases of the heart and circulation being the most
important, followed by malignant diseases and diseases of the respiratory
system. No less than 116 deaths were due to bronchitis and 63 to
cancer of the lung. In contrast 8 people died of pulmonary Tuberculosis.