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Sanitary Report, 1893.
7
The death rate throughout the country was
19.7 in the first quarter, being below the average
by 2.3; 17.9 in the second, or below by 12, but
in the third quarter it was 19.1, or 2.1 above. In
Willesden, including a portion of the deaths occuring
in the Workhouse, the death rate in the first
quarter was 13.3 per 1,000, in the second 14.5, and
in the third 17.4. It will be interesting to seek
the cause why, after four months ending with June
of such fine weather, there should have been such
an increase of sickness and mortality in the third
quarter. As might have been expected, summer
diarrhoea prevailed, 35 deaths of infants under one
year of age being due to it; there were also 10
deaths of infants due to inflammation of the mucous
membranes of the intestines, and 30 due to debility,
atrophy and inanition. These figures are sufficient
to account for the increase. As I have explained
on a former occasion, diarrhoea prevails when the
temperature of the ground four feet below the
surface reaches to about 56 degrees. The action
of the long dry season and the heat of June would
have raised the ground temperature sooner than
usual; it would also tend to produce large cracks
in the clay soil of this district, so that when the
rains of July fell, dampness, warmth, and aeration
of the ground were just the conditions most favourable
for the production of the disease
The meteorological condition appears to havehad
little or no influence on Typhoid Fever, although
in many instances it would appear that hot and dry
summers have been followed by a decided increase
of this disease on the occurrence of rain; but a
glance at the chart will show that no such increase
occurred, the exceptional rise in the last week of
August being otherwise accounted for.