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15
Stillbirths
Fifty-eight stillbirths were registered last year. This was a rate per
thousand population of 0.27, and a rate per thousand live and stillbirths
of 18.2. The rate per thousand births for the country as a whole was 19.7.
Of the thirty-two stillbirths about which particulars are known,
nine were to mothers confined at home, twenty-three in hospital. Of the first
group, two were the result of developmental abnormalities. In one the
mother had an ante-partum haemorrhage; in three the death had occurred
before delivery and in the other three during labour. Of those which
occurred to mothers confined to hospital, three mothers had ante-partum
haemorrhage, another four toxaemia. The labour of two was premature;
in six there was difficulty at labour; in four cases death occurred at
full-time confinement. Two were the result of blood incompatibility, and
one of developmental abnormalities.
Peri-natal Mortality
Very much the same conditions are responsible for many of the
stillbirths and for the deaths of infants in their first week, the early neonatal
period. So much is this the case that it is almost a matter of chance
as to whether the loss has to be recorded to one or the other group. For
some years now these losses have been classed under the term of perinatal
mortality, a rate which is calculated as the number of stillbirths and
deaths under one week combined per thousand total live and stillbirths.
The rate for this district for last year was 30.4 comprised of 12.2 the early
neo-natal rate and 18.2 due to stillbirths. The corresponding figures for
1959 were 25.2, 10.8 and 14.4.
Death of Infants one to five years of age
A child who survives the first year of life enters a period when the
probability of dying is very small. Some survive their first birthday in
spite of suffering from congenital abnormalities which later become
responsible for, or contribute to death. Weaker children, especially in the
earlier years, might succumb to infections which older children can
throw off.
Six children survived their first but did not reach their fifth birthdays.
I wo were in their second year; one in the third; two in their fourth and
°ne in her fifth. None of these deaths was the result of an accident.
Maternal Mortality
One death occurred as the result of pregnancy, being due to a
pulmonary embolism from a thrombosed leg vein following a natural abortion.