View report page

26
PART 2
COMMUNICABLE DISEASES
There was an appreciable decrease in the number of infectious
disease notifications received during the year, 1,891 as compared
with 2,190 in 1969. The decrease is accounted for by the expected
drop in the incidence of measles. The total number of confirmed
notifiable diseases reported, arranged in age groups and the areas
in which they occurred, is shown in Tables 1 and 2 which follow. A
commentary on the notifications is given below.
Vaccination and immunization against serious infectious diseases
is an important feature of communicable disease control and
details of this personal health service will be found in Part 4 of
the Report.
Acute meningitis
Two cases were notified, both children, who subsequently
recovered.
Diphtheria
No actual cases occurred, but a woman who attended the outpatients
department of a local hospital complaining of a recurrent
sore throat was found to be a carrier on bacteriological investigation.
Her family were therefore tested and her two children also
found to be carrying the organism. In view of this, all the children
and staff at the day school, Sunday school and clubs attended by
one child had nose and throat swabs taken. Four more children
proved to be carriers and a further two came to light after testing
the families concerned.
Where deemed necessary, family and school contacts were immunized,
a total of 414 injections being given.
In the course of the investigation nine carriers were traced, all
of whom responded to treatment, and a total of 3,280 nose and
throat swabs were taken.
Dysentery
Three hundred and one notifications of dysentery or suspected
dysentery were investigated, 163 being confirmed on bacteriological
examination. Fifty of these notifications related to single isolated