View report page

13
ENTERIC FEVER.
Two cases were certified and removed to hospital, but after being under observation
they turned out not to be cases as certified. There was a death due to enteric
fever credited to Shoreditch, but this occurred in an asylum away from the Borough,
and there is no reason for believing that, so far as infection was concerned, the case
was in any way connected with Shoreditch. A case was certified as one of continued
fever early in the year, but there was no reason for suspecting enteric fever.
The absence of cases during the year is a fact worth noting. The past records
of the Borough would be searched in vain to find a year without the occurrence of
enteric fever. Thirty years ago the yearly average of cases certified was about 120 ;
during the past five years the average has not exceeded three. The decrease in the
prevalence of enteric fever in the Borough began to manifest itself about the year
1903. This decrease is general in London and throughout the country, and the
indications would seem to point to the disease in the course of time becoming very
rare, and this perhaps in the not far distant future.
The cases certified in London numbered 432, being at the rate of 0.9 per 1,000
inhabitants.
The deaths numbered 48, the death rate being 0.01 per 1,000 population, and the
case-mortality 11.1 per cent. of the cases certified.
ERYSIPELAS.
The cases certified as erysipelas numbered 71, with eleven deaths.