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76
Report of the Medical Officer of Health.
The first case was notified on the 3rd February, one on the
2nd March, one on the 9th April, one on the 17th April, one on
the 19th April, one on the 23rd April, and one on the 24th April,
a total of seven, two of which proved fatal. Four of these
occurred in the same house.
It was not until the second case was notified that attention
was directed to shell-fish as the cause of the disease as no information
could be obtained in regard to the case notified on the 3rd
February. The information was to the effect that the patients in
every case partook of winkles bought from a local dealer who in
turn bought them from a salesman in Billingsgate market.
As soon as I was aware that the winkles had been bought at
Billingsgate, I (on March 26th) communicated with the Medical
Officer of Health for the City of London, who replied on the 3rd
April to the effect that samples had been taken from the dealer
and examined by Dr. Klein who reported that they did not show
general pollution, nor did they contain the microbes searched for.
On the 10th April I again wrote Dr. Collingridge informing
him that another case had been notified and asking for information
regarding the source of the cockles, to which he replied on
the nth April that the winkles came from the West Coast of
Scotland, and were collected from Oban, Skye, and Loch Fyne.
As soon as I was aware that the winkles had come from
Loch Fyne, or its neighbourhood, I communicated with Dr.
McNeill, the Medical Officer of Health to the County of Argyll,
who informed me that in August and September, 1903, an outbreak
of Enteric Fever, due to the consumption of shell-fish,
occurred in Glasgow, and that the shell-fish had been gathered in
Loch Gilp Head.
On the 8th May I received another letter from Dr. McNeill
in which he stated that the polluted area had been under observation
and that shell-fish from this area had been forwarded to
several dealers at Billingsgate.
Copies of the correspondence were sent to the Medical Officer
of Health for the City of London and he reported the facts to his
Sanitary Committee in May, 1906, and also that he was in