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MORTALITY
General Mortality and Death Rate
The nett number of deaths accredited to the district was 929,
13 less than in 1959.
This gives a crude death rate of 13.30 per 1,000 of the population
and a corrected death rate of 11.0 (the rate for 1959 being
10.90).
Once again, diseases of the heart and circulation made up the
greatest single cause of death in the Borough. Deaths from cancer
made up the second largest cause, the most alarming feature being,
of course, the continued increase in cancer of the lung and cancer
of the bronchus. This bears out what I have already said, that
modern epidemiology must take into account all the factors which
affect health or which produce death. These matters are, I need
scarcely say, of national rather than local importance. So far as can
be ascertained, there are no conditions existing in Southgate which
specially encourage either coronary thrombosis or lung cancer, at
least as compared with other parts of the country. Health education
must still remain our most powerful weapon in the fight against
these two very serious diseases. I myself have written on coronary
thrombosis on a number of occasions, while the County Health
Education Officer is paying particular attention to schools in an
attempt to persuade children to resist the temptation to start
smoking. This would seem to be the most profitable line of
approach, and it is sincerely to be hoped that efforts made in this
direction will have their effect on future generations.
Infant Mortality
There were 14 deaths of infants under 1 year of age, which
gives an infant death rate of 14.8 per 1,000 live births as compared
with 13 deaths and a rate of 15.3 in the preceding year.
Among the 14 infants who died in Southgate during 1960
before they had reached the age of 12 months, nine failed to
survive one week, one died at seven weeks, and the remaining four
died at the age of two months. Every infant death is carefully
scrutinised. Although the infant mortality figures for the last few
years are very much better than was the case not so many years
ago, it is obvious that we must continue our struggle to eliminate
all cases of infant death, whether the deaths occur in the first week,
in the first month, or in the first year.
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