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Annual Report on the Health and Sanitary
Condition of the City of Westminster.
1923.
Mr. Mayor, My Lords, Ladies and Gentlemen,
I have the honour to present my Annual Report for the year 1923.
It includes Returns required by the Ministry of Health and Home
Office.
Details of the various activities of the Public Health Department
having been given in the 1921 Report, it is not necessary to do more
than record any changes which have takeD place in 1923.
The year 1923, as measured by the death·rate of 11·6 per 1,000,
was the healthiest ever known in this country, the lowest record previously
having been 12 • 1 in 1921. Westminster participated in a similar manner.
The causes of this low rate of mortality are largely the comparative
absence of influenza until December, the consequent smaller number of
cases of respiratory diseases such as bronchitis and pneumonia, and the
absence until the end of the year of measles. Diphtheria and scarlet fever
were much less prevalent than in the previous year, and there was
scarcely any summer diarrhoea. In consequence infant mortality
reached a lower figure than in any previous year.
When the serious nature of the industrial depression prevailing throughout
the year is taken into consideration, the vast proportions of unemployment
and the relatively high cost of living, the figures, indeed, are
extraordinary, but they must not be taken as a gauge of the general good
health of the nation. They show that there was an absence of a large
amount of sickness from certain· causes, but there may have been ill·
health of a non·fatal character, and it is not improbable that the conditions
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