View report page

109
DEATHS NOT CERTIFIED.
Twelve deaths, males 6 and females 6 (against 12, 25, and
20 in the three preceding years), were returned as not having been
certified, either by a registered medical practitioner or by a
coroner. None of them occurred in the practice of unregistered
male practitioners. One of the deaths was stated to have
been registered on the information of a midwife. In the
remaining cases there appears to have been no medical
attendance. The several cases Were duly reported to the
Coroner, who did not deem it necessary to hold inquests. The
causes of death, as registered, were: in four cases, diseases of
heart, lungs; in three cases, old age; in two cases, paralysis;
and in one case each, premature birth, and epilepsy. In one case
the cause of death was "unknown." Nine of the deceased were
adults (six of them 60 years of age and upwards), three were
children, two of them aged one day and one four years.
The attention of the Metropolitan Sanitary Authorities
was called in 1887 to the subject of uncertified deaths, by the
Vestry of St. James, Westminster, that body being of opinion
that "no death should be registered unless the cause thereof is
certified either by a qualified Medical Practitioner, or by the
Medical Officer of Health for the District, or by the Coroner
upon inquisition." If it is meant that the Medical Officer of
Health should, as a part of his duty in that capacity, inquire
into and, if practicable, certify the cause of death, I for one
should respectfully prefer not to come under any such obligation.
It was stated that "at present three to four per cent, of
the total deaths are not certified at all." The proportion of uncertified
deaths has steadily declined from 4.7 in 1879 to 3.1 in
1888. The percentage varies within wide limits. In 1888 it
was l.0 per cent, in London; 0.4 in Kensington; ranging
upwards to 7.0 in Wales, where probably certification is often
impracticable, because, by reason of the inaccessibility of the
place of death, or remoteness from a doctor's residence, medical