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27
INFANTILE MORTALITY.
The infantile mortality rate of any district is the number of deaths of infants
under one year of age per 1,000 of the births which occurred in the same year.
The number of babies under one year who died in St. Marylebone in 1927 was
81, and the number of births in that year 1,374. The infantile mortality rate is
therefore 59, which is definitely the lowest ever recorded. It is lower by 22
points than the rate for 1926 (81), and 4 points below the figure for 1925 (63.0),
the next lowest rate on record for the Borough.
The course which the rate has taken is graphically shown in the chart on
page 29, which indicates clearly that in spite of occasional variations the only
really serious interruption to the decline was in 1917.
The means adopted in the Borough with a view to bringing about a reduction
in infantile mortality and generally improving the life and health chances of
infants and children are described in a separate section of this report—Maternity
and Child Welfare. This part being merely statistical, it is not proposed at this
point to do more than give some sort of analysis of the figures relating to deaths
amongst infants.
Causes.—A Table (Ministry of Health Table I.) will be found on page 28,
in which, in addition to the causes of death, is shown the distribution of the
deaths according to age and locality.
So far as age and causation are concerned, conditions vary little year by
year. In 1927, as in other years, the greatest number of deaths occurred in the
early weeks of life. Of the babies, 31 were less than one month old when they
died, and 37 less than three months. The figures for 1926 were 38 and 55.
The outstanding causes of death and the proportions traceable to them were
those usually noted. Prematurity (numbers 12, 13 and 14 in the table), which as
usual heads the list, caused 30 deaths, one less than in the year 1926. Diarrhoea
and enteritis (7 and 8) accounted for 16 in 1926, and for 12 in 1927. Respiratory
diseases, the third of the main causes, took 17 in 1926, and in 1927, 14.
The commoner infectious diseases together led to 4 deaths amongst infants,
the particular disease being in each case measles. One death was stated to be
due to overlaying, 2 to tuberculosis, 1 to meningitis, and 11 to pneumonia.
In the following table information supplementary to that in the large table
is given with regard to deaths in the various sub-districts.
Christ Church, which always contributes most largely to the infantile as to
most of the other mortality rates, being the most thickly populated area and that
in which there is most poverty, most overcrowding and most neglect of ordinary
precautions, is again at the head of the list with 37 deaths amongst infants. In
1926 the figure was 53.
Sub-District. Under 1 Week. 1 and under 2 Weeks. 2 and under 3 Weeks. 3 and under 4 Weeks. 4 and under 3 Weeks. 3 and under 9 months. 9 and under 12 months. Totals.
All Souls 6 — — — — 3 5 — 14
St. Mary 4 1 — — — 8 4 — 17
Christ Church 6 4 — 2 5 5 8 7 37
St. John 4 2 2 — 1 2 2 — 13
Totals 20 7 2 2 6 18 19 7 81