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§ The week for sickness benefit certificate ends on Tuesday, i.e., Dec. 2, Dec. 9, Dec. 16, Dec. 23.
It is clear that at some time in the latter part of the week ended 6th December, or
the early part of the following week, there was a sudden and radical change in the
incidence of sickness and deaths, quite unlike anything experienced in a normal
winter epidemic however severe. A day-by-day account of certain aspects of the weather
and of sickness and deaths in the County of London from 1st December, to 10th
December, is as follows :
Monday, lsf December—Weather at Kew—Fine most of the day except for periods in
morning and afternoon when fair. Mist in afternoon and evening. Fresh wind 06.40h.,
09.30h.-14.40h. (ENE). Frost in morning ; mean air temperature 36-9°F. Atmospheric
deposits at County Hall (reading taken at 09.30h. relating to the previous 46 hours)—
0-30 mg. of black matter per cubic metre, and 0-090 parts per million of sulphur dioxide.
District nurses in London County began treatment of 81 new respiratory cases ; 112
deaths occurred f in the County ; 261 calls were met by the accident ambulance service
and the average time the ambulances were out for a call was 44 minutes.
Tuesday, 2nd December—Weather at Kew—Fine until mid-evening, then fair to cloudy.
Mist in morning, haze in afternoon, then fog for a time in evening, thick 17.30h.-18.30h.;
mist until mid-evening. Frost morning and evening ; mean air temperature 34-2°F.
Atmospheric deposits at County Hall (reading taken at 16.30h. relating to the
previous 31 hours)—0-49 mg./cubic metre smoke, 0-155 p.p.m. sulphur dioxide.
District nurses began treatment of 69 new respiratory cases ; 140 deaths occurred in the
County ; and 215 calls were met by the accident ambulance service (average time per
call 35 minutes).
Wednesday, 3rd December—Weather at Kew—Cloudy at first then fair till mid-morning,
afterwards cloudless. Haze in evening. Fresh wind 02.50h.-15h. (N). Frost morning
and evening ; mean air temperature 39-0°F. Atmospheric deposits at County Hall
(reading taken at 16.30h. relating to the previous 24 hours)—0-61 mg./cubic metre
smoke, 0-220 p.p.m. sulphur dioxide. District nurses began treatment of 71 new
respiratory cases ; 143 deaths occurred in the County ; and 248 calls were met by
the accident ambulance service (average time per call 43 minutes).
Thursday, 4th December—Weather at Kew—Fine to fair early ; then generally cloudy
until mid-evening, afterwards fair to fine. Haze in afternoon and early evening, then
fog, thick 19.45h.-20.15h. Frost morning and evening ; mean air temperature 36.5°F.
*For weeks No. 43-49, 1952 and No. 50, 1950-No. 5, 1951 inclusive, the correlation between the weekly
number of sickness benefit claims expressed as a percentage of the mean of the three preceding years and the weekly number
of registered deaths similarly expressed is 0 94. The regression of the deaths so expressed on the sickness benefit claims is
y=48.6+0.54x. The 95 per cent, confidence limits for this regression coefficient are 0.44error of estimate is 11 as a percentage of the average for previous three years or 96 deaths in the week ended 13th December.
†The number of daily deaths occurring are taken from a paper by the Chief Medical Statistician at the General
Register Office. Logan, W. P., 'Lancet,' 1953, 1. 336.