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19
Food Poisoning:- July and August were the months of highest
incidence, during which more than half the total number of
treated cases were admitted. One case showed evidence of
staphyloccocal food poisoning, all the other cases being
salmonella infections. Of these, 18 were due to Salmonella
typhi-murium, one each to Salmonella thompson, Salmonella
enteritidis and Salmonella bovis morbificans. One salmonella
was unciassifiable. Five of the 23 patients were under one year
of age, the youngest being a week old on admission. This, as
well as past cross-infection experience, appears to indicate
that, at least as far as the prevalent salmonella typhi-murium
is concerned, spread of the infection frequently occurs without
any intermediate infection of food. Checks on the drug sensitivities
revealed 10 sulphonamide resistent salmonella, 5
tetracycline resistent, 2 streptomycin resistent and one neomycin
resistent. It would appear to correspond to the frequency with
which the different drugs have been used in salmonella infections.
Whooping cough:- The age groups of the patients admitted were:Under
one year - 8; 1-3 years inclusive, 9; over 4 years, 1;
The complications present were - pneumonia, 4 cases; and one
case of enteritis and secondary bronchitis.
Other infections:- Glandular Fever showed a further increase
Adolescents and young adults were mainly affected.
Influenza was prevalent in the first three months of the year
but was milder than in 1958. In addition to the 11 patients
tabulated as suffering from influenza, twelve of the pneumonia
patients admitted had an influenza-like history.
Meningitis:- The types admitted were as follows:- Meningococcal,
2; pneumococcal, 1; E. C. H. O. virus type 4, 2; E. C. H.O. type 7, 1;
unknown abacterial meningitis 3. In addition, 2 poliomyelitis
infection showed purely meningeal symptoms.
Poliomyelitis:- The low incidence of the previous year persisted.
Two patients had meningeal symptoms only, whilst the
other two had symptoms of both spinal and encephalitis involvement.
Spinal paralysis was of mild severity in one case and
moderate severity in the other. As in previous years, poliovirus
Type 1 was isolated in all cases.