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5
ANNUAL REPORT OF THE
MEDICAL OFFICER OF HEALTH
To His Worship the Mayor, Aldermen and Councillors of the Borough of
Harrow.
Mr. Mayor, Ladies and Gentlemen,
I beg to submit the Annual Report on the Health and Sanitary
Circumstances of the District for the year 1959.
As judged by the usual vital statistics, 1959 was another healthy
year for this district; the death rate was only 9.7 against a national figure
of 11.6. The infant mortality rate only 15.0 as compared with 22.0,
while this is the first year it is possible to record that there were no deaths
due to or associated with pregnancy.
The position as to the usual infections was satisfactory, there being
no heavy incidence of scarlet fever or whooping cough, while for yet
another year, the ninth in succession, the district was free from any case
of diphtheria. Measles was prevalent in the earlier part of the year, but
was not very damaging. The steadily improving position of tuberculosis
which has been a feature of recent years continued, there being a further
reduction in the number of new cases and a fall in the number of deaths
of which last year there were only six. Of the two less predictable infections,
this district had its share of the wave of influenza which attacked
the country in the earlier part of the year and resulted in there being a
sharp increase in the number of deaths. As regards the other—acute
poliomyelitis—the position nationally and locally was most satisfactory.
1958 had been a year of low incidence; but it was also a year with a cold
and wet summer so was one in which the incidence might be expected
to be low. 1959 though was a year of a quite exceptional summer, one
in which it might have been expected that poliomyelitis would have been
very prevalent; that the incidence in spite of conditions which are felt
to favour its prevalence was so low must be ascribed very largely to the
efficacy of the inoculations which so much of the population have had.
The routine pattern of the complaints which come in and which are
the basis of much of the work of the Public Health Inspectors was interrupted
more particularly this last year. At one phase there were many
complaints about Wealdstone Brook, the results of the inadequacy of a
sewer which the Council had already decided to supplement. There was,
too, the number of complaints about a slaughter house which for a time
was being used for the slaughter of a much greater number of animals
than usual. 1959 was, too, a year in which wasps were very common
and easily the greatest number of complaints ever received for the eradication
of nests came in. The number was so large in fact that it was not
possible to deal with them all.
It is hoped that two decisions reached during the year will lead to
a diminution in unsatisfactory states which have been the cause of many
complaints. The one was the decision of the Highways and Cleansing
ommittee to agree to the removal free of charge, of household waste