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16
The average death-rate for the preceding 10 years is
172.

The death-rates for 1908 have been corrected by multiplying
the net figures by the Registrar-Generals factor for correction
for St. Marylebone, viz.: 10652. This factor is one which it is
necessary to apply in order that a fair comparison may be made
between the death-rates of towns where certain conditions vary.
These conditions have no direct reference to the size of
population or the social or industrial conditions of the
inhabitants, but the correction is intended to abolish those
discrepancies which would otherwise exist in connection with
what is called the "age and sex distribution" of the population.
Towns, for example, having a large population of people of
middle age when death is infrequent, cannot fairly be compared
with those which have a large population of the very young or
the very old, in whom death, of course, is much more frequent.
Furthermore, it is known that the death-rate amongst women is
smaller than the death-rate among men, speaking, of course,
quite generally. By applying the correction to which allusion
has been made, these two discrepancies are virtually eliminated,
and a fair comparison is thus possible. The corrected deathrate
for England and Wales, as a whole, during 1908, was 147
and in the 76 great towns of England and Wales it was 15.8.
The figures for the other Metropolitan Boroughs are
given in a comparative table appended hereto. (See page 23).
On inquiring into the more prominent causes of death, one
finds that zymotic diseases have been responsible for 112 out of
a total of 1,845 deaths. Infantile diarrhoea, the fatal effects of
which are virtually confined to the first year of life, has been the
cause of 45 deaths, 32 of these being in infants under 1 year of
of age. Measles has caused the death of 24 children, and being
a disease of later life, its effects are manifest in the age-period 1
to 5 years. Scarlet fever comes next in order with a record of
13 deaths, and Whooping Cough and Diphtheria follow closely
with 12 deaths from each cause. Tubercular diseases have been
responsible for 203 deaths, of which no fewer than
125 have been at the most useful period of life, viz.,