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b. Tubercular Diseases.
15. The deaths from this class of maladies were 463; from pulmonary consumption,
which is the chief member of the class, they were 338. This is an increase upon
former years. It remains to be seen hereafter whether it is such as it might be
expected from the increase of our population at the ages which tubercular maladies
principally affect.
c. Diseases of the Organs of Respiration.
16. There can be no question about the low fatility of these diseases during 1859.
The deaths only amounted to 375. In former years they reached 392, 422, and 494,
There were 196 in the West Sub-district and 179 in the East. Of the whole
number 153 occurred in early childhood, the numbers in former years being 183, 210,
and 261.
SICKNESS.
17. The tables of Sickness (Tables IV and V.) appended to this report must be
regarded as supplementary only, inasmuch as while the mortality tables represent
all the deaths that occur in the parish, the tables of Sickness only exhibit a portion
of the illnesses that require medical aid, that portion which seeks relief in public
institutions. I must add with respect to the Small-Pox Hospital, that the comparison
of 1170 admissions, with the 358 of the previous year, does not of course represent
the proportionately increased prevalence of the disease in London, inasmuch as the
Hospital can be but full, as it has been the whole year. Forty-eight cases were
received from Islington. The type of continued fever remains the same, viz.
abdominal; 48 cases admitted into the London Fever Hospital being of true Typhus,
the remaining 172 of Typhoid.
SANITARY IMPROVEMENTS DURING THE YEAR.
18. The Table VI. is a summary of the house inspections and improvments
carried out under the orders of the Sanitary Committee between the 26th March,
1859 and the 25th March, 1860. But in addition I should mention the removal of a
vast number of other nuisances, such as foul accumulations of various kinds,
obstructions in panned privies and drains, most of which arise from the neglect of
furnishing them with a proper water supply. In Smith's Buildings, Jennings patent
water supply apparatus has been set up for domestic purposes. It remains to be
seen how far this is applicable to houses of that class.
TRADE NUISANCES.
19. Among trade nuisances I should record the complete abolition of a Piggery in
the rear of Francis place, Holloway, and of the trade of fat melting carried on in a
house in Nowell's Buildings, both of which had been the cause of frequent and loud
complaints from the neighbours. In several instances where overcrowding of
dwelling houses occupied by more than one family was discovered, the fault was
remedied on the receipt of a letter from the Office. The only instances where it
was found necessary to take proceedings before the magistrate, were the cases in
Brand Street, Holloway, Payne Street and Adelaide Square.