London's Pulse: Medical Officer of Health reports 1848-1972

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Islington 1860

[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for Islington, Parish of St Mary]

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42
REPORT
ON THE
SANITARY CONDITION OF SAINT MARY, ISLINGTON,
FOR JUNE, 1860.
No. XXXIX.
The month which has just elapsed has been remarkable, meteorologically, for
its comparatively low temperature, and for an almost daily fall of rain. The
mean weekly temperatures varied from 3.2 to 5.3 degrees below the mean
temperature of the corresponding weeks for 43 years, (Glaisher), and during
the 35 days over which this report extends, there were only nine in which
more or less rain-fall was not measured at Greenwich. With all this, the
health of our population has been tolerably satisfactory. The number of deaths
registered was 216, a number which represents a smaller weekly mortality
than has occurred since June last year. The uncorrected mean of the four
last years was 205.
With respect to the diseases embraced in the zymotic class, it is gratifying
to be able to announce that the month has passed away without the registration
of a single death from small-pox. Measles, however, has occasioned 24
deaths, a very unusual proportion for the month of June. The weekly
numbers were 4, 2, 7, 4, 7.
There have been 11 deaths from scarlatina. Two of them occurred at
31, Buckingham Street; Mr. Selwood who attended these cases states, that
" during the progress of this disease in the family, the Regent's Canal, near
the banks of which is their residence, was cleared out, and it is probable that
the miasma exhaled by this process caused the low secondary fever, and this
materially contributed to the fatal result." The process referred to is always
an offensive one, and ought not to be conducted without some sanitary