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8
Typhus and Typhoid fevers caused 125 deaths in the Parish, besides 33
which occurred amongst St. Pancras people in the Fever Hospital. This is a
higher mortality than in 1863, when the deaths from those fevers numbered
113, but lower than in 1862, when they numbered 156. In London, as a
whole, the Typhus deaths were 3689, so that St. Pancras did not furnish, in
proportion to its population, so many deaths from fever as other parts of the
Metropolis. Still, the mortality from this cause is too high, considering the
natural advantages St. Pancras possesses, and the number of open spaces, and,
as compared with many metropolitan districts, the sparse distribution of its
inhabitants. It is to be regretted that under the heading Typhus, two distinct
forms of fever are registered, one which is mainly aggravated by overcrowding
; the other (known as Typhoid or Gastric) which is aggravated by defective
drainage, attacks rich and poor alike, and is never absent from London,
especially in the autumn. The first form, Typhus proper, has been epidemic
in London since December, 1861, previously to this having been absent
for several years. It is a disease which never occurs in those under
favourable sanitary conditions, except by contagion. The contagion does
not spread widely, but is very powerful in its action when ventilation
is not well carried out, and especially when a number of cases of the
disease are brought together. It is one of the diseases in which sanitary
measures are most obviously of use ; so much is this the case, that if overcrowding
and privation could be prevented, isolation of the sick enforced, and
thorough cleansing of clothes and bedding well carried out, an epidemic of
typhus might probably be always arrested in its course. It is, however, impossible
at present to prevent overcrowding. The law relating to this matter
is not sufficiently explicit, and such as it is cannot be fully enforced without
crowding the workhouses to an enormous extent. House-rent is higher than
ever in London, and the dwellings of the poor are constantly being removed
by railway extension and in other ways. In this parish a great part of Agar
Town has been pulled down, and much of Somers Town is condemned to the
same fate. Rooms, adapted to accommodate a family with 6 or 8 children, so
as to ensure a fair amount of ventilation, cannot be obtained at less than from
5s. to 8s. per week, or from £13 to £20 per annum, which would swallow up
an undue proportion of most labouring men's wages. The result is, that men
having large families, and earning less than £ 1 a week, must live in rooms too
small for them, and as a consequence, disease is engendered, and infectious
diseases are propagated to a lamentable extent. It has been shown that consumption
and the so-called tubercular diseases are developed by want of pure
air more than by any other cause; these diseases account for 866 deaths last
year, about one-sixth of the total number of deaths. There is a clause in
the Nuisances Removal Act which authorises you, as the local authority, to take
proceedings for the abatement of overcrowding, when any house whose
inhabitants consist of more than one family is certified by me, as medical officer
of health, to be so overcrowded as to be dangerous or prejudicial to the health
of the inhabitants. If I were to give certificates to this effect in all cases in
which the health of families is suffering from the small size of their dwellingrooms,
the number of such certificates would be very large ; and if proceedings
were taken in all these cases, many families would be turned into the streets
from their inability to pay for rooms large enough for them. It is a most
difficult point to decide what degree of overcrowding shall be permitted to
remain undisturbed, and when interference is absolutely required. A line must
be drawn somewhere, and after consultation with other Metropolitan Medical
Officers of Health, it is thought that a cubic space of 300 feet should be
required as as a minimum for each individval, or 400 for each adult and 250