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Shoreditch Infirmary or into the general hospitals in the neighbourhood. Under
the Metropolitan Asylums (Measles) Order, 1911, and the Metropolitan Asylums
(Whooping Cough) Order, 1912, persons not paupers reasonably believed to be
suffering from measles or whooping cough may be admitted into the hospitals of
the Metropolitan Asylums Board. A similar order, dated 1912, applies in like
manner to puerperal fever.
The notifiable infectious diseases, cases of which are now receivable into the
hospitals of the Board, are small pox, scarlet fever, diphtheria, enteric fever,
typhus fever, poliomyelitis, puerperal fever, and cerebro-spinal fever. The
number of cases of these diseases certified (Table II. (Appendix)) was 556, and the
number removed to hospital (not necessarily to hospitals of the Metropolitan
Asylums Board) was 531, which gives a percentage of 95.5 as compared with 96.1
in 1912, 97.0 in 1911, 97.7 in 1910, 97 in 1909, 97.3 in 1908, 97.5 in 1907, and 96 in
1906. The percentages for previous years are contained in the report for 1905.
RETURN CASES.
One instance came under observation in which scarlet fever followed on the
return home of a patient who had been suffering from the disease and treated in
hospital. The facts are briefly as follows :—Leonard Charles C, aged 18, was
certified to have scarlet fever on June 4th and removed to hospital. He had been
ill at home for several days. He returned home on July 23rd and on the 26th
Rosie G, aged 2½, of the same address, was taken ill and certified to have
scarlet fever on July 28th. There was nothing about Leonard Charles C to
indicate that he was likely to convey the disease and it is not free from doubt that
he did so, for it was noted that Julia G, aged 11, sister to Rosie, had had a
"sore throat," about which she saw a doctor on July 18. The mother looked
for a rash in this case but none was noticed, nor was there any evidence of
desquamation.
SMALL POX.
There were no cases of small pox in Shoreditch during the year, and only
about 4 cases were certified in the whole of London.
VACCINATION.
The last official figures as to vaccination in the Borough are those published
with the report of the Medical Officer of the Local Government Board for 1912-13,
and relate to the year 1911. Of the births registered during that year, in 40.9 per
cent, vaccination was successfully performed and 35.5 per cent, were not finally
accounted for, the latter figure including postponed cases. Altogether 48.6 per cent,
of the children whose births were registered in 1911 were unvaccinated at the end
of the year. The last figure includes those exempted by conscientious objection