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93
ERYSIPELAS
Sixteen persons last year were notified to be suffering from erysipelas,
9 men and 7 women. In ten cases the face was the affected site, in four the
leg and in two the arm.
Two of the patients were admitted to hospital. None of the cases
was fatal.
MENINGOCOCCAL INFECTION
Although five persons were removed to hospital suspected to be
suffering from meningococcal meningitis, in only one instance, a boy of
nine months, was the diagnosis confirmed.
ACUTE ANTERIOR POLIOMYELITIS
Most of the 15 people who were suspected to be suffering from acute
poliomyelitis were removed to hospital. The diagnosis was confirmed in
only three of the cases. The first was a boy of fourteen who fell ill in
March; the next an adult woman whose onset was in July, and the third
an adult male who fell ill in September. All three suffered from paralytic
attacks.
1958 proved to be a year of low incidence in the country as a whole.
The usual rise of cases in the summer was at a slow rate. The curve rose
to a low maximum of 86 notifications in the week ending 11th August,
after which there was a decline. The incidence was irregular in the
succeeding weeks with a result that the highest number of notifications
113, were received in the week ending 11th October. After a sharp fall in
the next week, figures showed no marked tendency to fall, with a result
that the numbers of notifications in some weeks in 1958 were actually
higher than those of the corresponding weeks of the previous year,
although in general, the incidence had been that much higher in 1957.
The total number of notifications in the country as a whole was 1,997, a
rate per thousand population of 0.04, a figure which compared with that
of 0.08 in the previous year.
The lighter incidence of 1958 could be ascribed in part to the weather
conditions, in part to the effect of inoculations. In regard to the effect of
the latter, it is significant that the figures were low in the earlier weeks of
the year, that is at a time when no substantial proportion of the population
had been inoculated.
Inoculation. When the arrangements for inoculation against
Poliomyelitis started in this country in the Spring of 1956, those eligible
were children born in the years 1947 to 1954. Those of these ages who
registered at that time were the priority class to be treated before any
others. Because of the difficulties in supplying vaccine, it was not until
the end of 1957 that all these could in fact be treated.
In the Summer of 1957 those children born in the years 1955 and
1956 became eligible for treatment. Many of these were given their first
doses before the end of 1957.