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(not being notifiable diseases) are always kept in readiness and have been
left at all houses where it came to my knowledge that these diseases
were present, and in the case of the two latter, have also been distributed
at all other houses in the immediate neighbourhood. This is, I think,
the best way of dealing with such diseases as Measles and Whooping
Cough. The necessary knowledge as to where these diseases are present
is supplied to me chiefly by the School Attendance Officer and the
School Authorities.
This system of notification by the School Attendance Officer and
the School Authorities, instituted in 1898, works satisfactorily as
far as can be judged at present.
Small Pox.—No cases were notified in this District.
The Vaccination Act of 1898, which came into force at the end of
that year, continues, there is reason to believe, to produce good results in
this District. I have been unable to obtain the statistics as to the
relative number of successful vaccinations performed before and since
the Act came into operation, but there is no reason to doubt that
the same comparative results have been obtained in this District as in
the country as a whole.
The following facts will therefore prove interesting and
instructive:—
Last year the Local Government Board prepared a return of the
comparative number of successful vaccinations recorded during the years
1898 and 1899.
This return shows that while in 1898 there were 500, 314 successful
vaccinations, in 1899 there were 669,349. The increase in the number
of vaccinations in 1899 as compared with 1898 was therefore 169,035
or 33.8 per cent.
Now the number of births registered in England and Wales during
1898 was 923,265, and during 1899 was 928,640, so that the ratios of
successful primary vaccinations to births registered were 54.2 per cent
in 1898 and 72.l per cent in 1899, an increase of 33 per cent in 1899
as compared with 1898.
These results are, I think, very satisfactory, and it is gratifying to
feel that so many more persons are now protected from Small Pox than
was the case before the Act came into force.
Scarlet Fever. There were 50 cases notified from 39 houses, as
against 55 in the preceding year, and 35 in 1898; they were notified
from the different localities as follows:—2 from Smthgate, 13 from New
Southgate, 16 from Winchmore Hill, and 19 from Palmers Green and
Bowes.
In 15 houses sanitary defects were found. Three cases were imported,
and 5 were secondary cases occurring in houses from which pre-