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in two rooms with the parents and seven other children. In another, the
family, including six children, lived in two rooms. In the case of two families
who occupied two rooms, there were five children in each family; another two
families occupying the same number of rooms had four children, respectively.
Four families living under similar conditions had three children each. Four
of the families lived in one room.
During 1925, 66 deaths of children under five years of age were due to
Whooping Cough and its complications. This corresponds to 10 per cent. of
the total deaths under five years of age.
The number of deaths from Whooping Cough in the first quarter was 45,
or 26.5 per cent. of the total deaths of children under five years of age. 34
were under a year-and-a-half old; 26 of these were under a year, and 10 of
the latter were under six months.
The younger the child, the greater is the likelihood of the attack proving
fatal. Whooping Cough has been more prevalent and Broncho-Pneumonia
has intervened more frequently, due to the more treacherous weather we experienced
during the first quarter of the year, which was the most fatal. 37 of these
deaths, or 83 per cent., died in Public Institutions, and only eight died at
their homes.
Whooping Cough is not a notifiable disease, but the Metropolitan
Asylums Board admit patients suffering from Whooping Cough into their
Fever Hospitals whenever the Medical Officer of Health certifies that there are
urgent reasons why the patients should be removed, or on the request of
Medical Superintendents of the Poor Law Institutions. In the first quarter
of the year, 18 children were admitted to Fever Hospitals, of which number
4 died.
The disease was, naturally, more fatal among delicate children. Of the
45 children who died in the first quarter of 1925, 8 had been delicate from
birth, another puny child had been prematurely born, and two were twins.
Both parents of one child were consumptive, and were constantly away
from home for special treatment. In another family the child's father was consumptive,
and the family, consisting of the parents and three children, lived in
two rooms.
Epidemic Diarrhœa,
The number of deaths was 114, or 41 more than in the previous year.
18 belonged to the Limehouse District, or at the rate of .33 per 1,000
30 „ St.-George-in-the-East „ „ .72 „
49 „ Mile End Old Town „ „ .46 „
L7 „ the Whitechapel District „ „ .30 „+