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26
been undertaken, would doubtless have been received with
similar ungracious fervour by the ignorant.
I shall take this opportunity of relating Beckenham experiences
in regard to this disease, and of bringing to your
notice modern ideas on the subject.
On analysing the figures, there were 132 cases in 98
houses: in 3 houses there were 4 patients; in 2, 3 patients; in
21 houses, 2 patients; and in 72 houses, 1 patient.
Thus in 72 houses the disease only occurred once, and it
would appear that isolation of the patient and subsequent
disinfection of the premises was successful.
In the houses in which 2 cases arose, 4 failed within eight
days of the first case. With regard to the others, failure of
the second case took place at the following intervals of time:
2 failed within 9 days, 1 in 10 days, 1 in 13 days, 1 in 17
days, 1 in 48 days, 1 in 56 days, 1 in 63 days, 1 in 91 days,
I in 94 days, 1 in 117 days.
In six instances 2 cases were notified the same day.
In the two houses in which three cases arose, in one of
them the cases all occurred about the same time (October 17th,
18th and 24th), but in the other, two of them were notified on
the same date, but the third was not notified until 80 days
afterwards.
Of two batches of 4 cases notified from two separate
houses, the following was found: At both these houses the
series of 4 cases were notified at one time. In one instance a
child, who had been under medical care since February 17th,
was notified on March 14th together with three other children
as suffering from Scarlet Fever dating from March 11th.
Here it would appear reasonable to suppose that one undetected
case gave rise to three others.
The third batch of four cases was notified on one
day: In two of the cases the date of onset of symptoms
occurred on the date of notification, in the third it happened
4 days before the notification, and in the fourth 17 days
before. In this instance also it would appear that a mild
undetected case of Scarlet Fever had given rise to the three
other cases.