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London County Council.
Public Health Department,
Spring Gardens, S.W.
5th April, 1894.
REPORT OF THE MEDICAL OFFICER ON ANTHRAX IN LONDON.
{Printed by order of the Public Health Committee, 16th April, 1894.)
On September 9th, 1893, a letter was received from the deputy-coroner for Southwark, stating
that at an inquest held on the body of F. W. Morgan, who died from anthrax communicated from
imported dried skins, the jury had requested him to draw the attention of the Council to the case in
the hope that it would use its influence for preventing the recurrence of any similar calamities. I was
therefore instructed to report on the matter.
The question of the occurrence of anthrax in persons engaged in the London hide and skin trade
was carefully and exhaustively enquired into some ten years ago by the late Mr. John Spear, whose
report is contained in the 12th annual report of the medical officer of the Local Government Board
published in 1883. This report gives an account of the. hide and skin trade as carried on in London,
and contains the results of Mr. Spear's inquiries into the extent of prevalence of anthrax among those
engaged in the trade. A concluding section of the report discusses suggested remedial measures. During the
ten years which had elapsed since the publication of Mr. Spear's report, an increasing amount of
attention had been devoted to the subject. Alterations had, moreover, occurred in the leather trade,
and the bearing of these changes, if any, upon suggested remedial measures required to be considered.
With a view to collecting the information available since Mr. Spear's report was written,
Dr. Hamer has been instructed to ascertain as far as possible the extent to which this disease has
prevailed in London, and to make inquiry into the circumstances of the cases, and of the hide and skin
trade generally.
I now present Dr. Hamer's report on this subject. On the question whether there has been any
increase of this disease in man during recent as compared with earlier years, Dr. Hamer has felt some
difficulty in arriving at any positive conclusion. There has been an undoubted increase in the
recorded cases, but with this has to be considered an increase of knowledge of the appearances
of the local lesion, enabling cases of this malady to be better recognised. It deserves, however, to be
stated that notwithstanding that Dr. Russell in Glasgow, and Mr. Spear in an inquiry at Bradford,
directed attention, in 1878 and 1881 respectively, to the occurrence of internal anthrax in this country,
but one case of this form of the disease could be heard of as having occurred in London since the date
of Mr. Spear's report.
A large number of the cases of external anthrax inquired into by Mr. Spear were associated
with the manipulation of a particular consignment of China hides. The more recent cases
Dr. Hamer did not find especially associated with hides from that country, but he did find much reason
for thinking that dry hides as distinguished from wet hides were especially productive of the disease,
and as there appears a tendency in the trade to discourage, for other reasons, the use of dry hides, he
finds ground for hoping that the substitution of wet hides for dry hides will be attended by a lessened
risk to those manipulating foreign hides in London.
During recent years, London tanners have practically ceased to use dry foreign hides, and their
men have during this period been much more free from anthrax, while cases of this disease have been
recorded with undiminished frequency among the sorters and labourers engaged in the brokers' warehouses
where dry foreign hides are manipulated.
The practicability of ensuring the exclusion of diseased hides from this country is not now greater
than at the time of Mr. Spear's inquiry, and no advance has been made in the application of methods
of disinfection to foreign hides before their shipment. So far, therefore, the safety of those who
manipulate hides is dependent upon precautions taken in London.
Mr. Spear placed "in the very first rank of defensive measures the dissemination of a knowledge
of the danger among workmen," in order that remedial measures should be adopted at the earliest
moment, and he gives a form of notice to workmen employed by one firm. Dr. Hamer, who shares this
view, finds ten years later this firm still exhibiting the same notice, and failed to find a similar course
being adopted by other firms with whom his enquiry brought him into relation. The dissemination of
knowledge in this manner is especially necessary in view of the fact that a considerable number of
persons employed in the trade are casual labourers who have no experience of the risks to which they
are exposed. Inasmuch as many of the places where hides are stored cannot be made subject to
special requirements under section 8 of the Factory and Workshops Act, the Committee might, I think,
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