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6
At the time of writing this report the tuberculosis regulations of 1930 have been repealed,
and in their place we have new regulations which in summary cause tuberculosis to be notified
to the Medical Officer of Health of the borough council and by him to the County of London.
The injunction to keep a register no longer applies, though in a circular issued on 18th April,
1952, Medical Officers of Health are advised of the advantage of continuing to do so.
The following table sets out the position in St. Pancras in 1950, with the comparison
of some of the other boroughs in London:

The number of persons on the register at the beginning of the year was 1,436. This had
increased by 171 to 1,607 by December 31st. Insofar as it was possible a visit was paid in
every case where we became aware of a case of tuberculosis in the borough. In all, 274 addresses
were visited. The results of these investigations are well worth examination. Statutory
overcrowding existed in 23 cases of pulmonary tuberculosis and in three cases of non-pulmonary
tuberculosis. 166 persons suffering from tuberculosis did not sleep in a separate bedroom, and
in 22 cases of pulmonary tuberculosis where the patient was infectious, as indicated by the
finding of the tuberculosis bacillus in the sputum, the patient actually slept in the same room
as children. In 9 of these cases the families were overcrowded within the meaning of the
Housing Act, 1936, and in the remaining cases if the patient slept in a separate room it would
often have meant the use of the living room as a bedroom.
I have tried to divide the new infections into various categories associated with the
type of employment of the sufferer. Category 1 includes professional people, category 3 the
artisan and category 5 the unskilled worker. Category 2 comes in between 1 and 3 and
category 4 between 3 and 5. Of the 274 cases investigated six were in category 1, 22 in
category 2, 86 in category 3, 104 in category 4 and 56 in category 5. These figures tend to
indicate to some extent that the better the conditions of education and living the less is the
risk of tuberculosis. As against this it must be remembered that the majority of the persons
living in the borough would normally fall into categories 3, 4 and 5. In 39 of the above cases
accommodation included basement rooms and only 93 of the families lived in self-contained
dwellings. 108 patients had a separate bedroom, 166 a separate bed.
I would refer in particular to the fact that in 76 of the 274 homes visited it was necessary
to serve notices for a sanitary defect. This alone justifies the work involved by your sanitary
inspectors in visiting homes where tuberculosis has been notified. At least in 27.-7 per cent.
of the homes was it possible to provide some improvement as a result of the visit.