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9
SMALL POX AND VACCINATION.
The mortality from Small Pox was higher during 1867 than it has been
in any year since 1863 ; and with the exception of that year the number of
deaths was higher than it has been for more than 12 years past. In 1867
the number of Small Pox deaths was sixty-five, in 1866 the number was
forty-three, in 1865 twenty-seven, in 1864 fourteen, in 1863 eighty, in 1862
nineteen, in 1861 only seven, in 1860 thirty-one, in 1859 thirty-seven, in
1858 twenty-two, 1857 eleven, in 1856 eighteen, and in 1855 the number was
forty-two.
This is not a satisfactory state of things, and I am quite convinced that
if Vaccination of the best sort were carried out throughout the whole parish
in as complete a manner as is provided for by Acts of Parliament, such a
death-rate from Small Pox would be impossible.
It is to be hoped that the New Vaccination Act, and the regulations
issued by the Privy Council will tend to render Vaccination more thorough
and more general than it has been. The duty of enforcing the Vaccination
Acts is imposed by the Legislature on the Guardians, and not on the Vestry,
who are under nearly every other Act of Parliament the Guardians of public
health, and the local authority for enforcing sanitary law.
The return of Vaccination, supplied to me by Mr. Moore, Clerk to
the Guardians, for the year ending Michaelmas, 1867 (see page 11), shews that
for 7,552 registered births, only 2,561 children were successfully vaccinated
by the Public Vaccinators under the age of one year. It must be remembered
that there are also two Government Vaccine Stations in St. Pancras, which
are not given on this list, at which are vaccinated nearly 2,000 children, a
large proportion of whom belong to this Parish. Still after allowing for these
Stations, and also allowing for children vaccinated by private medical practitioners,
and also for children who die under the age of three months, or
whose health renders them unfit for the operation, there can be no doubt
that the vaccination of a large number of children is delayed much too long,
or altogether neglected. The number who refuse to have their children
vaccinated, from a belief that the operation is an objectionable one, is so
small that it does not appreciably affect the proportions of unvaccinated to the
number who are born.
The Guardians of St. Pancras have already decided to reduce the
number of public Vaccinators from 17 to 6, in accordance with the Regulations
of the Privy Council. It might appear at first sight that such a
measure, by reducing the number of places at which the public can get their
children vaccinated, would diminish the facilities for vaccination ; but in
practice exactly the opposite is the case. " Facilities for vaccination " require,
above all things, that parents should not have to make fruitless visits
in search of vaccination; and that they should not be supplied with an indifferent
kind of vaccination, that is both unprotective to their children and
distasteful to themselves. The best kind of vaccination is from arm to
arm, and such a number of cases should come together at each time of