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5
Public Health Department,
Council Offices,
Billet Lane,
HORNCHURCH.
12th June, 1953.
To the Chairman and Members of the
Hornchurch Urban District Council.
Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen,
I beg to present to you the Annual Report on the health of the
district during 1952.
Vital Statistics.
The Birth Rate—13.8—is down compared with last year (14.1).
The Infant Mortality Rate has risen from 16.84 to 32.2, whilst the
Death Rate showed little change at 10.4 vice 10.3 in 1951 and is still
below the general average.
The national figures for this year compare somewhat favourably
with those for 1951 and locally—especially as regards our infant mortality
figure—our trend has not followed the national example. It
should however, be noted that our infant mortality figure for 1951 was
very low and our present figure even although it shows a considerable
increase is only now very slightly higher than the national average
figure for comparable areas.
Infectious Disease.
The most evident comparative features as against 1951 are the
increase in Scarlet Fever cases and the diminution in Measles and
Poliomyelitis notifications.
Tuberculosis.
The number of notifications and the death rate alike dropped
markedly and provided a substantial encouragement that the attack
on this disease is succceding. Everyday experience amply proves
that the time has not yet arrived for the disease to be regarded as other
than a major national and personal anxiety.
Housing.
Steady progress in Council building was maintained and our postwar
record in this respect is one for satisfaction.
Atmospheric Pollution.
Our investigations—pursued as part of a national framework of
research into this problem—were continued and provided much valuable
information of a specialised nature. This is a subject which is rightly
assuming increased public importance and the burden of enquiry has
in the past been left too exclusively to progressive Authorities. This
position has probably largely eventuated through an absence of sufficiently
widespread local interest and central stimulus. No urban and
few rural authorities can justifiably regard the state of the atmosphere
as being the sole privilege of someone else to investigate.