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divisions have visited the Gas Council's laboratories and health visitors and others making
domiciliary visits have been asked to report unsatisfactory gas installations in the homes
they visit. The British Medical Association in 1955 set up a sub-committee to enquire
into the problem of accidental death and ill-health from coal gas poisoning. As part of
the inquiry a field survey was conducted in health division 7 (Camberwell and Lewisham)
of the gas appliances used by a representative sample of aged and infirm people receiving
assistance from the home help service, as a result of which it was considered that because
of age and special disabilities some 10 per cent, of the people visited were likely to be
especially prone to accidents with gas appliances. Nearly all the old people used gas
cookers, some 19 per cent, of which required some attention but only 1½ per cent, were
so seriously defective as to need to be replaced. A further inquiry showed that nearly
half the old people may be unable to identify the smell of coal gas until a highly toxic
concentration is reached. In a Tenants' Handbook issued to tenants of the Council's houses
and flats by the Housing Management Department, information is given on home
safety generally, including the correct use of gas and electric appliances and boilers.
The other major groups of fatal accidents are suffocation and inhalation of food
which affect mainly children under five years of age. The Council has agreed to help
in an inquiry sponsored by the Ministry of Health under the direction of Professor Banks
of the Department of Human Ecology at Cambridge University into sudden deaths in
infancy. It is understood that an interim report to the Ministry is in course of preparation.
One of the few encouraging features ascertainable from the various facts and figures
is that the number of fatal accidents to children under five has been falling—from 871 in
1950 to 824 in 1952 and to 663 in 1955. The number of children concerned has also fallen
by some 12 per cent, but the reduction in the number of accidents is of the order of
24 per cent. In this age group, although the figures for individual causes fluctuate from
year to year the number of deaths from poisons and scalds, over which some direct
control can be exercised, has roughly halved over the period of five years. The reverse
of the medal—the increase in falls among the aged is not so susceptible to reduction
because, as will be seen later, 60 per cent, are due to old age and infirmity.
To summarise the data on fatal accidents—diree-fifths are falls affecting almost
wholly persons over 65 years of age and of this age group mainly women; coal-gas
poisoning and bums are next—about one-tenth each and again affect mainly the aged ;
some way after come inhalation of food and suffocation and these affect mainly the
under fives. The causes of these accidents are discussed more fully in the next part of this
report which deals with non-fatal accidents.
Non-fatal accidents
Information about non-fatal accidents was collected from three sources, i.e.:
(a) The London Ambulance Service.
(b) Health Visitors.
(c) District Nursing Associations.
The information provided by these sources, while not complete either as to numbers
or causes, would, it was assumed, provide a substantial sample of home accidents. As
the prime duty of the London Ambulance Service is to remove the patient, detailed
enquiries could not be pursued, but the particulars obtained suffice as a general index of
trends (generally for the more serious cases) as regards the age and sex of the person
concerned and type of home accident. The other two sources, health visitors and district
nursing associations, cover respectively children under 5 and (mainly) old people, the
two groups which provide over 80 per cent, of fatal home accidents. In these cases more
detailed information has been sought about the underlying cause of the accidents in
order that propaganda could be directed to the right people and deal with the right
objects. Whereas the reports from district nursing associations cover all (completed)
cases for whom care is provided, those from the health visitors relate only to those
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