View report page

The mortality from scarlet fever has been 11, differing ltttle from that
of June. A large number of cases, however, have been recorded, so that the
disease appears to have been on the increase. The weekly deaths were 2,
2, 5, 2, viz., 1 at "Wace Cottage in No. 1 district (at which house two
infants (died last year), and 1 in Nos. 6, 7, 11, and 13 in the "Western
half of the parish, and in the Eastern, 1 in No. 22, and 5 in No. 30
(Lower Eoad), where the disease has been chiefly located.
There has also been the unusual number of 7 deaths from croup registered.
Bowel complaints have only occasioned 7 deaths, the uncorrected mean
of the previous six years being 31. All but one occurred in children under
two years of age. The total number of cases attended by the parochial
surgeons was only 69, almost as few as were attended by them in the cold
July of 1860 (54). The weekly numbers were 9, 26, 18, 16. There
has been an unusual number of deaths from heart diseases, viz., 19, -4,
12, 8, andi 6 being the number registered in the several years immediately
preceding this.
Among the cases of fever which occurred in the workhouse, one was
the bathman. his duty being partly to attend to the tramps. He died of
typhus in the Fever Hospital on the 29th. His predecessor died of typhus
last January, and this man, whom I had recommended to sleep in a
different part of the house, declined to avail himself of a privilege which
might have tended to protect him from the influence of the poison.
I had expressed my anticipation of his being attacked. A death from
child-bed fever has also occurred in the workhouse.
The time appears to have arrived when the construction of a new workhouse
should be seriously entertained.
EDWAED BALLARD, M.D.,
Medical Officer of Health.
Vestry Offices,
August 2nd, 1862.