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MORTALITY
General Mortality and Death Rate
The nett number of deaths occurring in the district was 921,
eight less than in 1960.
This gives a drude death rate of 12.9 per 1,000 of the
population and a corrected death rate of 10.8 (the rate for 1960
being 11.0).
I have already made mention in the introduction to this Report
of the established connection between smoking and health. This,
I need scarcely say, is reflected in the deaths from cancer of the
bronchus and lungs, bronchitis, coronary thrombosis and psychosomatic
diseases such as gastric and duodenal ulcers. I will say
nothing more here relating to smoking and health, since this is
a matter which has received great publicity during 1962, and
should be a matter for more detailed survey in the Annual Report
for that year.
So far as coronary thrombosis is concerned, diseases of the
heart and circulation still make up the largest single cause of
mortality in the Borough. Year after year I have mentioned the
fact that, although diseases such as coronary thrombosis and lung
cancer take an appalling toll of life, particularly the lives of men
at the height of their power, "Epidemiology" as we know it, is
still closely linked with infectious illnesses. This is not to say
that infectious illnesses should not receive careful attention. The
fact that most infectious diseases are now mild in nature, especially
such diseases as pertussis and scarlet fever, by no means implies
that this mildness will continue. None the less, the sooner it is
realised that such diseases as heart disease call for more careful
study and until the causes of heart and similar diseases are discovered
and the appropriate remedies applied, death rates will
continue to be much higher than most of us would like to see.
As I have remarked before, there are no conditions actually
existing within the Borough which one can point to as contributing
to cardiac disease. It is a fact, however, that Southgate shares
with the rest of the country the strain of modern life, which is
clearly having an effect upon so many families. The journey which
so many of our residents have to take to and from London every
day is presumably a factor which must be taken into account.
Finally, Southgate, as a built-up area, even if not a congested
area, leaves its population more vulnerable than the population of
rural areas, where the tempo and strain of life are not so hectic,
and where, incidentally, a smoke-laden atmosphere does not
constitute a real health hazard.
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