London's Pulse: Medical Officer of Health reports 1848-1972
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Hints from the Health Department. Leaflet from the archive of the Society of Medical Officers of Health. Credit: Wellcome Collection, London
Croydon 1946
[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for Croydon]
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81
Infant Mortality.
The Infantile Mortality rate was 31 per 1,000 live births
registered.
For the past 5 years the number of infant deaths have been
1942—187, 1943-1-37, 1944—156, 1945—145, and 1946—151.
Among the 151 deaths, 87 occurred in boy babies and 64 in
girls. Of the births, 2,444 were males and 2,362 females. The
infantile mortality rate for the two sexes was, therefore, Boys—
36, Girls—27.
120 deaths of infants occurred in Institutions, including
Registered Nursing Homes.
The following table is intended to show the deaths of babies who at one time or another during their first year attended a Clinic, as compared with deaths among those who never attended. If a baby only attended once it is included in the Clinic returns:—
| Deaths | Attended M. & C. W. centre | Attended at Birth by | Full Time Baby | Births during the same period | Deaths in Institutions | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Yes | No | Doctor | Midwife | Doctor & Midwife | Not known, etc. | Yes | No | Not known, etc. | Mayday Hospital | Regd. Maternity Homes | St. Mary's Hospital | Other Institutions | ||
| 118 | 29 | 89 | 11 | 68 | 30 | 9 | 85 | 30 | 3 | 4806 | 79 | 3 | 7 | 7 |
3,719 babies under one year of age attended the Clinics for
the first time during 1946. Within the same period 4,806 babies
were born and 151 died; 33 of these latter are not included in the
above table, as information concerning them was not obtainable.
Although the clinic attendance figures and the births and deaths
figures do not cover precisely the same periods, the attendances
of new cases at the clinics do not fluctuate so greatly as to cause
serious error. Of the 118 babies tabulated who died, 29 had
attended a clinic in Croydon and 89 had not attended, i.e., 25 per
cent, of the deaths were in clinic babies and 75 per cent, in nor-
clinic babies. Of the 4,806 babies born, approximately 3,810
attended on calculation based on past attendances. The infantile
mortaliay, estimated on this basis, is only 8 per 1,000 births for
the clinic babies, and 89 per 1,000 births for non-clinic babies.