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12
Pneumonia
and other
respiratory
diseases
Mortality from pneumonia rose sharply in 1940 and remained higher than formerly
until 1943, when it began to fall, reaching in 1945 and 1946 a level lower than the
average of the intermediate and pre-war years. The rate for ' other respiratory diseases '
was distorted in 1940 by the statistical revision of cause of death, but thereafter declined
fairly steadily. The steady downward trend of these two rates, which is, no doubt,
associated with the sulphonamide and antibiotic therapies, was broken in 1947, 1949
and 1951, when severe weather conditions in the first case and influenza epidemics in
the two latter cases raised the rates above the prevailing level. In 1952 the pneumonia
death-rate was 0.61 per 1,000, as compared with 0.64 in 1951 and 0.50 in 1950, and the
rate for ' other respiratory diseases', excluding bronchitis, was 0.12, as against the
same figure in 1951, and 0.10 in 1950. The rates in 1952 remained high in consequence
of the lethal fog in December, already referred to, which caused the death-rates from all
respiratory causes to leap to unprecedented heights in the subsequent week.
Road
accidents
The number of London residents who died in motor vehicle accidents in 1952 was
221, as compared with 282 in 1951 and 245 in 1950. The number of persons who were
registered in London in those years as dying in motor vehicle accidents, whether London
residents or not, were—for 1952—205, for 1951—259, and for 1950—207. It is clear
that many London residents come by their death in motor vehicle accidents outside the
confines of the County. The current rate of slaughter on the roads within the County
is substantially the same as it was between 1870 and 1890, that is, between 200 and 250
a year, having declined substantially from the peak of 822 deaths in the year which it
reached in 1930. It is exceedingly doubtful, however, if this decline represents any
increase in safety on the County's roads; almost certainly the major part of it must be
attributed to the great improvements in the treatment of the injuries which continue to
be inflicted.
Other
violence
Other violent causes of death accounted for 1,142 deaths. The corresponding figure
for 1951 was 1,252. The peaks in the diagram on page 11 are due to the heavy toll of
air raids.
Infant
mortality
The infant mortality rate in 1952 was 23.1 per 1,000 live births, which is an
improvement on the rate of 25.4 for 1951. The movements of the death-rates from the
principal diseases at ages below one year since 1911 are shown in Table 7 (page 177).
The diagram illustrates the decrease in the fatality of infants since the years 1911-14.
The increase in deaths assigned to congenital malformations and injury at birth is
partly attributable to changes in classification following the adoption of the fifth
revision of the International List of Causes of Death, which added about 12 per cent,
to the deaths which would formerly have been assigned to this group, and partly also
to a tendency for post-mortem examination to be made more frequently, thus resulting
in increased precision in certification. In most diseases there has been a dramatic
reduction in mortality over the past forty years, and even since 1927 the improvement
is substantial. The pronounced fall in case mortality of whooping-cough and measles
has also helped to bring down the infant mortality rate. Diarrhoea and respiratory
infections, too, are now less frequently contracted, and methods of treatment are more
effective. Increased attention has been given to the care of the premature infant, and
there are signs that these efforts are having a salutarv effect on the mortality risk.
Neo-natal
mortality