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The Urban District Council of Acton.
ANNUAL REPORT OF THE MEDICAL OFFICER
for the year 1898.
To the Chairman and Members of the Acton District Council.
Gentlemen,
The year 1898 was remarkable, from a meteorological point, for
the persistent absence of rain, the mild conditions which generally
prevailed when cold should have been experienced, and the phenomenal
heat of September, which equalled the highest record of this century,
viz. 92.1 shade temperature.
During the quarter ending September 30th, the infant mortality
was 124*2 per 1,000 registered births. The majority of deaths was
due to causes which are recognised on all hands to be, in a measure,
preventable; for they were practically restricted to the children of the
poorer class and were largely due to parental ignorance and neglect of
the laws of health and disease.
The question of educating the public as regards infant feeding and
the ordinary rules of hygiene, wilt I trust, ere long be taken up in
earnest by the Government and those responsible; for it is truly
lamentable that one-fourth of the whole mortality in the British Isles is
among children under one year of age.
Our system of education should concern itself with teaching every
scholar those ordinary principles of hygiene, which are of the first
importance to the individual and the community, even to the sacrifice
of other matter which is now taught.