View report page

21
Typhoid and Paratyphoid Fever
Five cases of typhoid fever and one case of paratyphoid 'B'
were notified during the year and in all cases the source of infection
was from abroad. The case of paratyphoid 'B' occurred
in a man aged 53 years who had just returned from a holiday in
Spain.
The first case of typhoid fever occurred in a boy aged 8 years
who had recently arrived from Jamaica; the second case, a baby
of 1½ years, had just returned from the Continent; the third case
was a young man aged 20 years who had come to this country
on holiday from Spain and it appeared that just prior to his leaving
Spain he had felt unwell, although not so acutely as to stop him
from travelling. All contacts were investigated.
The remaining two cases, a boy aged 5 months and a girl aged
1½ years, were cousins and lived in the same house. In the case
of the baby boy, the disease proved fatal. Whilst investigating the
contacts, two carriers were discovered in the same household, the
grandmother of the children from whom it was thought they contracted
the disease and the young girl's mother. Both the girl and
her mother responded well to medication and recovered. The
grandmother, however, refused treatment and returned to Italy.
With one exception, all the adult contacts living in the house
worked in a hospital kitchen; this at first proved a problem, but
alternative employment not connected with food or a hospital
was found for them with the assistance of the Ministry of Labour.
Whooping Cough
Fifty-three cases were notified during the year and one child
aged three months died from the disease.
Smallpox
No case occurred in the Borough during the year.
Notifications are received from Port and Local Authorities
whenever persons who may have been in contact with smallpox
are known to be coming into the Borough. Observation for the
necessary period is kept on these persons by members of the staff
of the Health Department but no such notifications were received
during the year.
Under the Public Health (Aircraft) Regulations, 1952-63, persons
arriving in this country by air, who are not in possession of valid
international certificates of vaccination against smallpox, must be
placed under surveillance for up to 17 days. With the ever-increasing
flow of air travel, more and more people come to this country
to stay, permanently or otherwise, and during the year 38 such
persons who were proceeding to addresses in the Borough were
kept under observation.