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under one year. The corrected decennial average is 103.
Eighty of the deaths were in the Town sub-district, and
89 were registered during the first half of the year.
Reference has already been made to the indifference of parents in
regard to the spread of measles in their families. The observation
is even more generally applicable in regard to whoopingcough,
the danger of this always distressing malady being
unappreciated by the poor, who, in the engrossing struggle of
life, pay scant, attention to an ailment which they deem at once
inevitable and seldom dangerous. Often enough, when the
disease ends fatally, the event comes as a surprise, being due
commonly to some secondary disease—of the respiratory organs,
or of the nervous system: few deaths are registered from
whooping-cough alone. These secondary diseases cannot always
be prevented; but the occurrence of bronchitis or pneumonia, for
instance, is often owing to want of care in the management of
the sufferers. The little ones it may be are not confined to the
house; they catch cold; the "cold" and the "cough" are not
differentiated; medical treatment is not sought until the child
is obviously very ill, and, when it is obtained, the patient is but
too frequently beyond the reach of help.
The deaths in London from whooping cough (2,987) were
327 fewer than the decennial average; but the disease was
unusally prevalent during the first quarter of the year; it then,
after some irregular fluctuations, fell below the average, and
remained so throughout the rest of the year, so that the effects
of the severe outbreak in the first quarter were more than
counterbalanced in the remaining nine months.
FEVER.
No death was registered from Typhus Fever, and only two
from Simple Continued Fever. The deaths from Enteric Fever
were 21, the same as the corrected decennial average. Seventeen
of the deaths were registered in the Town sub-district, and four
in Brompton. Eight of the deaths took place in hospitals, to