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92
It is hardly necessary to add that no action was taken in the
matter, and at the present writing (June) the change of Government
has led to a change in the Presidency of the Board. The
state of public affairs, moreover, precludes all hope of any attention
being bestowed on this important question by the existing
Parliament.
VOLUNTARY NOTIFICATION OF INFECTIOUS
DISEASES.
While awaiting the advent of a system of compulsory notification
of infectious diseases, constant efforts have been made, ever sincemy
appointment in 1871, to obtain, by “voluntary notification,”
information of the occurrence of such diseases, and it will not be
out of place to recapitulate the sources from which such information
is now received.
1. By virtue of an arrangement entered into between your Vestry and the
sub-district registrars in 1871, I receive notice of every death from the
graver infectious diseases, (small-pox, scarlet fever, diphtheria, typhus,
enteric and simple continued fevers), immediately after registration.
When a death from an infectious disease has occurred, there is always a
probability of finding cases of illness in the same house or in the
locality, and such discovery not unfrequently results from the Sanitary
Inspector's visit made, as it is, without loss of time. Occasionally the
registration of a death is unduly delayed—sometimes, apparently, with
the object of temporary concealment of the cause of death ; it would
be well, therefore, if registration within a limited period, say twentyfour
hours, were made compulsory.
2. The Relieving Officers, by direction of the Board of Guardians, report all
cases of the graver infectious diseases that come to their knowledge, and
generally these are cases that have been, or are about to be, removed
to the hospitals of the Asylums Board. Admittance to these hospitals
(although practically denied to no person), can, theoretically, be obtained
only on the order of a relieving officer, or of the master of a workhouse.
3. The Asylums Board report all cases of small-pox and fever admitted into
their hospitals. In practice, the Board has thrown wide open the doors
of the hospitals, and many cases are admitted without the intervention of