View report page

27
It is not quite obvious on what grounds it is proposed that
the Guardians of the Poor should be represented on a Board
which should have purely sanitary functions, but with this
exception, the report may be accepted as offering a satisfactory
solution to this difficult question.
Experience alone can show what may be the effect of the
aggregation of even so small a number as 30 or 40 cases of
small pox, but it may be hoped that hospital provision for
this disease will become less and less wanted as better
facilities are given for securing the vaccination and re-vaccination
of persons living in houses in which cases of small
pox occur.
The existing arrangements in London for this purpose are
altogether inadequate to secure that end, indeed the only
legal provision which has been made relates solely to cases in
which the person attacked with small pox happens to be a
pauper, and even then as a matter of practice this provision
is rarely acted upon.
Such difficulties will always occur so long as important
sanitary measures are merely a branch of poor-law administration.
It is only when the principle is accepted that the
assistance offered is for the protection of the public, rather
than for the relief of the individual, that considerations of
the social condition of the sufferer will not be permitted to
limit the benefit of aid which is necessary for the safety of
the community whether the individual be a pauper or not.
SANITARY CONDITION OF DIFFERENT
SUB-REGISTRATION DISTRICTS.
I am glad to be able in the present report to compare with
greater accuracy than before the rates of mortality in the
different sub-registration districts. For the purposes of comparison
the following figures are taken from the tables already
given. In their preparation the deaths of non-parishioners
occuring in public institutions in the parish are excluded,
from consideration, while the deaths of parishioners occurring
in public institutions in all parts of the Metropolis are
included, with the exception of 138 deaths from 'all causes,'
including 16 from tubercular, 26 from pulmonary, and 7
from zymotic diseases, which could not be referred to the
district to which they belong.