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Infectious Diseases.
During the past two years a new Table in the Annual Report
has shown the distribution of infectious diseases according to the
various Wards in the Borough. The relation of Whooping Cough to
density of population is well shown in the "House" Wards in the
Borough in which an epidemic of this disease occurred in 1956. A
measles epidemic occurred in the two West Wickham Wards.
Only one case of Poliomyelitis was recorded during the months
of July and August. The majority occurred from October to December.
Of eight confirmed cases there was one death in an adult of 32 years
from bulbar spinal poliomyelitis. It may well be that this incidence
of poliomyelitis in cooler weather is a feature of the disease when it
is not epidemic.
In January, an Ex-Serviceman who had returned from Malaya
in June, 1955, was admitted to the Hospital for Tropical Diseases,
where he was diagnosed as Benign Tertian Malaria. There was no
history of a previous attack and no secondary cases.
Investigations of food poisoning incidents were carried out with the
helpful co-operation of the family doctor. In one instance, two tins
of cream of celery soup were examined from a family where vomiting
occurred three hours after taking the food. The unopened tin gave a
negative result ; the opened tin showed slight sporing aerobes–not
a cause of food poisoning. Faecal specimens from four other members
of the family were negative.
Of the salmonella infections, one, a boy of 4 years, was notified
on discharge from hospital as a carrier of salmonella typhi-murium.
Contact specimens from three members of the family were negative,
and within a week of discharge two further negative specimens were
obtained by the hospital and the boy was declared free from infection.
Another infection was of salmonella Reading. The organism
was first isolated on the 13th September. Specimens from two other
members of the family were negative, but from the mother one specimen
was positive. Subsequent specimens from the contacts proved
negative. In spite of full antibiotic treatment, which resulted in two
negative specimens on the 11th and 12th days after treatment, positive
specimens were obtained from the 14th day, and the patient, though
fit, has had to be transferred to a different occupation for a year.
In April, three cases of sonne dysentery were notified. Final
negative specimens were obtained on 13th May. Another family of
two adults and five children had positive specimens for one adult
and three children, and negative specimens for one adult and two
children. Final negative specimens were obtained after supervision
from the 7th to 25th June.
In another, salmonella typhi-murium infection in a baby 1 year
old, specimens from other members of the family were negative,
while in a fourth family, the father and a daughter of 15 months had
salmonella typhi-murium infection, but cleared in 14 days. Three
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