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32
Sou 2
Perish of Saint George the Martyr, Southwark.
REPORT OF THE MEDICAL OFFICER OF HEALTH,
For the first Quarter, 1857.
No 5
Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen of the Vestry,
I beg now to present to you my Report for the first Quarter of this Tear. It
consists chiefly of tables, in which are comprised all the particulars necessary to make you
acquainted with the healthy or unhealthy condition of this Parish, and of the sanitary works
performed or left unfinished during the Quarter. The Mortality is about 50 less than the
average of the Quarter for Ten Tears; it is slightly above the numbers recorded for the
first Quarter of 1850, 1853, and 1856; but allowing for increase of population, it does not
exceed the Mortality of the corresponding Quarters, even of those most favourable Tears.
Much attention has of late been given to the subject of over-crowding; it demands our
most earnest attention for two reasons. It brings sickness and death upon the poor, and
ruinous expense upon the Parish. My present Report shows that the most crowded Boroughroad
district suffers one-third more deaths than either of the others, although its actual
population is less: the London-road district, with 159 persons to the acre, shows 98 deaths;
the Kent-road, with 172 to the acre, 97 deaths; while the Borough-road, with 244 to the
acre, shows no less than 136 deaths. The Poor Law books show, for the London-road district,
804 cases of illness among the poor attended during the Quarter; for the Kent-road district,
1,074 cases, while our most crowded district yields 1,731 cases; that is, 900 more cases in
one Quarter than in the one district, and 700 more than in the other. I need not say that
this represents an enormous call upon your poor-rates, and as I have said, the deaths are
one in three in excess.
Deaths from zymotic diseases have decreased generally in the Parish one-half; 33 this,
as against 63 last Quarter. I have no doubt that some at least of these results are from the