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to the
VESTRY OF ST. MARY, ISLINGTON.
Gentlemen,
1. The Report which I have this year the honour of submitting will be found to
differ in some respects from those which have preceded it. In the first place, I have
substituted for the customary Table of Mortality, based upon a second laborious and
minute tabulation, a Table which consists simply of a summary of those contained in
my monthly Reports, so far extended, however, as to give particulars as to deaths at
various important periods of age below 20 years. To this I have at length been reluctantly
driven by the enormous increase of our population, and consequent bulkiness of
the returns to be classified. The only important dilference now is, that this Mortality
Table is to be compared with the Annual Summary of the weekly Returns of Births
and Deaths in London, issued by the Registrar General, instead of comparing it with
the Tables in his Annual Reports. In the next place it will be remarked that, while
leaving the mortality and sickness Tables to tell their own tale in a great degree, I
have this year dealt more at length on the relation which may ba traced between mortality
and disease on the one hand and local unsanitary conditions on the other, as this
relation may be traced in a portion of the Parish where the death rate is, year by year,
the highest. It has, however, been necessary to enter into full particulars respecting
the epidemic of small pox from which we are now emerging. In the third place, I
have thought I could see some advantage in detailing, more fully than I have lately
done, the work carried out during the year under the direction of the Sanitary
Committee.
MORTALITY AND DEATH RATE.
2. The number of deaths registered in Islington, exclusive of those of strangers in
the Hospitals, during the 53 weeks embraced by 1804, amounted to 3,854. To these
we must add 169 more deaths, as our probable share of the deaths that took place in
various Metropolitan Institutions for the reception of the sick, (fee., thus giving a
total mortality of 4,023 persons. Correcting this for comparison with an ordinary
year of 52 weeks, we arrive at the number of 3,946 deaths. This is one element in
calculating the death rate of the year. The other, namely, the population, is less
readily determined, and, notwithstanding the recent census, is already liable to erroneous
estimation. Judging from the rapid progress of building and occupation of
new houses, especially in the Northern half of the Parish, it is tolerably certain that
the rate of increase has not been less than the mean annual rate of increase during the
decenniad 1851-61, namely, 5 per cent., calculated upon the population of each preceding
year. Tfius estimated, our population in the middle of 1863 would have been
173,235, and the consequent death rate 227 per 10,000 living. This is an unusually
high rate, but still is not so high as that of the Metropolis generally, which is estimated
by the Registrar General as 245 per 10,000. Commenting upon this high death rate,
lie adds, "this lact should arouse the vigilance of the Boards of Works, for if they
cease to carry out the recommendations of their Health Officers, the ground gained
will be lost, and London will no longer be the healthiest large city in the world."