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ANNUAL REPORT
OF THE
MEDICAL OFFICER OF HEALTH
FOR THE YEAR 1959
June, 1960
To the Chairman and Members of the
Ruislip Northwood Urban District Council:
Mr. Chairman Ladies and Gentlemen
1959 was comparatively uneventful in the Public Health
field as far as this district was concerned. The main vital
statistics are set out in the following pages, and need little
comment, as there is comparatively little variation from the
previous year,
The expected increase in the number of measles cases was
experienced 1,078 as against 327 in the previous year and there
were no deaths from this disease or from whooping cough. Once
again no case of diphtheria was notified in this district
there has been no case since 1946. This is surely a tribute to
the success of the immunisation scheme which is accepted so
readily by the majority of parents. In this scheme, protection
against diphtheria is still regarded as of paramount importance.
although the other diseases against which protection is offered
poliomyelitis, whooping cough, tetanus and smallpox are also
of considerable significance. As yet a vaccine combining
protective agents against all these diseases except smallpox has
not been produced, but work towards this end is being pursued
in many parts of the world. The best that has been done in this
country so far is a triple substance to protect against
diphtheria whooping cough and tetanus so that in the majority
of cases, an infant still needs quite a formidable series of
injections, as well as vaccination against smallpox in order to
be thoroughly protected. It is, therefore most gratifying to
find how readily protection for their children is accepted by
the majority of parents and the results are seen in the
infectious diseases incidence figures. In the only and fatal
poliomyelitis case, the presence of the infection was discovered
post mortem, the actual cause of death being a heart condition.
There were three cases of typhoid fever in the district all in
the same family. Despite many weeks of careful investigation and
the following up of all possible sources, it is still not possible
to say with certainty where this infection came from. There was
no case of smallpox but again I feel it necessary to repeat what
I have said on previous occasions. This district is quite near
a major airport through which pass passengers and crews who,
a few hours previously may have been in endemic or epidemic
smallpox areas. Despite all airport medical control sooner or
later a smallpox case or a person incubating smallpox - will
arrive in the community and the subsequent sequence of events can
well be imagined. The only safeguard is efficient vaccination
and re-vaccination and primary vaccination is most easily and
most safely carried out in infancy or early childhood.
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