View report page

35
The number of swabs from doubtful cases submitted for bacteriological
examination was 160. A positive result was returned in 31 instances. The greatest
number of cases came from All Souls' District, viz., 48, the others contributing as
follows :—Christ Church 45, St. Mary 37, and St. John 17.
As regards age in connection with prevalence of the disease, 58 of those affected
were aged 1-5 years, and 54 5-15.
Though it is practically certain that all those who were affected were treated with
antitoxin—the 96 per cent, who went to hospital certainly were—only in one case was
application received for a free supply of the remedy under the Diphtheria Antitoxin
(London) Order, 1910.
In investigating the notified cases, the following nuisances were detected and
dealt with by the Inspectors:—
Dirty Premises, etc. 38.
Defective Drainage 14.
The source of infection so far as could be made out was in 14 cases in the home
of the patient, from a previous case in his own family in 9, and in another family in
the same house 5.
Scarlet Fever.
The number of cases notified was 259. This compares very favourably with
figure for 1911, viz., 329, as well as with that for 1910 when only 207, the smallest
number for several years, were notified.
From the chart inserted at the beginning of the report it will be noted that
except for two or three weeks in January and March the number of cases weekly was
well under the average of the previous 10 years.
The highest number reported in any one week was 15.
The case mortality of the disease, though the average case was quite mild, was
higher than in 1911; the total deaths numbered 11 as against 7 in 1911, and the
number of deaths per cent, of the total cases notified 4.2, the figure for 1911 being 2.1.
The actual source of infection in the majority of the cases was not made out.
Most of the patients were children of school age and attending school, and there
seemed to be some reason for believing in certain instances that infection had been
contracted there. From inquiries made by the Inspectors in 17 instances infection
appeared to be traceable to a previous case in the same family; in 6 to a previous
case in the same house, and in 17 to another case in the same neighbourhood. In 13
instances the source of infection could not be classified.
Defects in sanitation to the number of 60 were discovered. Of these 51 were
want of cleanliness, etc., and 9 defects in drainage. The nuisances were remedied
after the service of notice in each case.
Enteric Fever.
As compared with 1911, 1912 was distinctly a non-enteric year, and the fact that
the cases numbered only 11, as against 18 in the former year, rather bears this out.