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57
ACUTE ANTERIOR POLIOMYELITIS
In 1947 this country suffered its greatest invasion from poliomyelitis.
Two indications of what was to come had been given in July : the incidence
started to rise much earlier than usual, and the increase in the numbers of
weekly notifications was unusually rapid. The rise was remarkably
steady once it had set in, reaching a peak in the week ending September
6th.
In 1918 the incidence was only slightly higher than normal. 1949
saw much the same beginning as the outbreak of 1947. There was,
however, an early arrest in the rise of the curve of incidence early in
July and again later in the same month. Apart from these declines, the
curve in general was flatter than the 1947 curve. This resulted in the
general incidence being something less than half that of 1947. On the
other hand the rise in incidence continued much later, and the peak was
not reached until the week ending October 15th. The fall, slow to
start with, became more rapid towards the end of the year, but the
incidence still remained higher than normal, 61 cases being notified in the
last week of the year.
Locally the outbreak was erratic in distribution. Although in the
earlier weeks of the outbreak many patients were admitted to the isolation
hospitals suspected of suffering from this infection, the number of confirmed
cases in July was only three, and in August only two. There were,
however, eight in September, five in October, four in November and then
one in December, the total number of cases in the local outbreak being
13. This figure includes four, the number of abortive attacks in which
the patients suffered from no paralysis, but who had nevertheless been
attacked by the virus.
There was one instance of two brothers being attacked. Apart
from this occurrence there was no association of any of the patients
with known cases.
Once more a striking feature was the slight degree to which infants
were attacked, only three of the patients being under five years of age.
Nine (five boys and four girls) were children between the ages of five
and ten, and nine (six males and three females) were over 21 years of age.
The oldest patient was a man of 65, the youngest a boy of one. Only
seven of the 23 patients were females. Apart from the four abortive
cases, a further four patients recovered completely with no paralysis.
Three patients were still in hospital at the end of the year. Two cases
proved fatal, a man of 36, and a girl of five, who each suffered from
polioencephalitis. The remaining ten cases were suffering from some
degree of paralysis, for which at the end of the year they were still
attending for treatment.
MEASLES
The district suffered from a minor outbreak of measles which was
at its peak in the latter part of the first quarter of the year. Notifications
rose steadily from the figure of eleven in the first week of the year to the
peak figure of 207 in the week ending February 26th. Remaining high
through most of March, the figures then fell until single figures only were