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15
1884. The Kensington rate was 5.2 below the Metropolitan
rate (21.0), this being 1.8 above the average. The deaths from
the principal diseases of the zymotic class (including 6 each
from small-pox and measles, 3 from diphtheria and 4 from enteric
fever, 11 from whooping cough, and 16 from diarrhoea),
were 48, and were above the average (to the number of 10),
for the first and only time in 1884. Fifty-two cases of small-pox
were recorded, 30 and 22 in North and South Kensington
respectively. The mean temperature, 63°.0, was l0.8 above the
decennial average, and, as usual with so high a temperature, there
was a considerable increase in the fatal cases of diarrhoea, which
rose from 2 in the previous period to 16, the same as the corrected
decennial average. The deaths from diseases of the respiratory
organs, which had been 51, 31 and 38 in the three preceding
periods, were only 25 in the four weeks. Somewhat numerous
sudden deaths from heart disease and syncope were probably due
to the depressing and exhausting effects of the hot weather.
In the eighth period (29th-32nd weeks—July 13 to August 9)
the deaths from diarrhoea further rose to 39, in addition to 6
from "choleraic diarrhoea," the mean temperature having
advanced slightly, viz., to 630.2, or 10.1 above the decennial
average. The death rate, moreover, rose to 16.0, but it was 1.3
below the decennial rate, and 8.0 below the Metropolitan rate,
(24.0), which, however, was 1.7 above the average. The deaths
from the principal diseases of the zymotic class (55), which in the
preceding period had been 11 above the average, were in this
period 2 below the average, notwithstanding the extensive
prevalence of infantile diarrhoea. The high temperature, so fatal
in its consequences to young children (98 of whom under the age
of one year died within the four weeks), was favorable to the aged,
leading as it did to a considerable reduction in the number of
deaths (there were 18 only) from diseases of the respiratory
organs. Thirty-four persons only died at 60 and upwards in this
month. There were 2 deaths from small-pox, but the recorded
cases fell from 52 in the previous period to 7, 5 of them in
North Kensington.