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159
[1913
or guardians of the patient, who were made aware of the infectious nature of
poliomyelitis, and an offer to have the premises disinfected was made. This
offer was in most instances accepted, although in one or two cases it was
refused. Disinfection was, however, only left optional to them in the early
part of the year, for latterly it has been insisted that the rooms occupied by
the patient, as well as the bedding and clothing, should be disinfected. This
was effected by fumigation or spraying the rooms with formaldehyde, and by
removing the bedding to the disinfecting station, where it was passed through
a Goddard, Massey and Warner steam disinfector.
The latter precaution has been adopted more for the purpose of bringing
home to the minds of the people the infectious nature of the disease than because
it was considered necessary, for so far as the Medical Officer of Health can
discover, its virus is easily destroyed, and probably would not require such a
process. He bases this opinion on the fact that Romer states that he exposed
an active emulsion to formalin vapour, and found that the virulence of the
emulsion was destroyed.
Perhaps it is not astonishing to find that many people in whose family
the disease has occurred cannot be brought to look on it as infectious when
even now some medical men do not deem these precautions to be necessary,
stating that it is nothing more than what was known formerly as infantile
paralysis, about which no fuss was ever made. This opinion is now nearly
dead, and the profession as a whole view these cases in a serious light, and are
anxious to assist the Medical Officer of Health in adopting any precautions
that lie may deem desirable.
Epidemic Cerebro-spinal Meningitis.
This disease, which was fully discussed in the Medical Officer of Health's
Annual Report for 1907, is also known as " Spotted Fever," and to it were
credited 8 cases, two of which were subsequently proved not to have been
diagnosed correctly, and the attack rate was equal to 0.02 per 1,000 of the
population. The return is five below that for each of the preceding six years.
Three of the attacked died. In England and Wales the rate was 0.01; in
London 0.02; in the County Boroughs 0 01, and in the Rural Districts 0.01.
The disease has been notifiable since 1907, since which time, to the end
of 1913, 77 persons have been reported, of whom 44 have died Thus the
fatality was 57.1 per cent., which is an appalling figure. Fortunately the
cases of this disease are not numerous.