London's Pulse: Medical Officer of Health reports 1848-1972

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Hints from the Health Department. Leaflet from the archive of the Society of Medical Officers of Health. Credit: Wellcome Collection, London

Shoreditch 1912

[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for Shoreditch]

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Table: Subjoined is a list of the infectious diseases which are notifiable, excluding pulmonary tuberculosis, showing the numbers of cases certified in the Borough for each of the four quarters of the year, and the numbers and percentage of the cases removed to hospital:—

Subjoined is a list of the infectious diseases which are notifiable, excluding pulmonary tuberculosis, showing the numbers of cases certified in the Borough for each of the four quarters of the year, and the numbers and percentage of the cases removed to hospital:—

Disease.First Quarter.Second Quarter.Third Quarter.F ourth Quarter.Total.Deaths.
Small Pox............
Scarlet Fever or Scarlatina322940501514
Diphtheria & Membranous Croup3330472713718
Typhus......111
Cholera............
Enteric Fever (Typhoid)284..144
Continued Fever............
Relapsing Fever............
Puerperal Fever142184
Erysipelas404030391496
Plague............
Cerebro-Spinal Fever..32..53
Glanders............
Anthrax............
Hydrophobia............
Acute Anterior Poliomyelitis............
Ophthalmia Neonatorum832417..
Totals11611712712248240
Numbers and percentages of cases removed to hospitals70759581321
60%64%75%67%66%

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As compared with the figures for 1911, the cases of scarlet fever, diphtheria,
enteric fever, erysipelas, and ophthalmia neonatorum all show decreases. There
were no cases of small pox nor of acute anterior polio myelitis. There was 1 more
case of cerebro-spinal fever and 3 of puerperal fever than for last year. The
deaths from the principal zymotic diseases which are notifiable, namely small pox,
scarlet fever, diphtheria and enteric fever, were at the rate of 0.23 per 1,000 population
whereas the rate from the principal zymotic diseases which are not notifiable,
namely measles, whooping cough and diarrhoea, was 1.87, or eight times as great.
Generally it may be stated that the year 1912 in respect to the prevalence of
notifiable infectious diseases in Shoreditch, excluding pulmonary tuberculosis, was
most distinctly satisfactory, the cases being smallest in number and the attackrate
the lowest so far recorded for the Borough.
ISOLATION OF INFECTIOUS CASES.
Cases of small pox, scarlet fever, and diphtheria removed to hospital, with
very few exceptions, are taken to the hospitals of the Metropolitan Asylums Board.
Cases of enteric fever, puerperal fever, and erysipelas not infrequently go into the
Shoreditch Infirmary or into the general hospitals in the neighbourhood. Under