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PREFACE.
Public Health Offices,
Ilford.
March, 1925.
To the Chairman and Members
of the Ilford Urban District Council.
Madam and Gentlemen,
I have the honour to present herewith the Annual Report
required by the Ministry of Health and Board of Education.
The table on page 24 shows that Ilford maintains its place
as far as health is concerned. The figures are most noticeable
when infectious diseases are considered. I pointed out last year
that the Zymotic death-rate (or death-rate from the chief infectious
diseases) was the lowest recorded. In 1924, however, the
Zymotic death-rate was still lower. The position is most satisfactory
as far as diphtheria is concerned. A less number of cases of
Diphtheria was notified than for the past fourteen years. In fact,
since the year 1900, only in 1900, 1901, 1905. and 1910 were fewer
cases notified. In 1924 only 1 death from diphtheria occurred in
the district; this is the lowest number of deaths recorded from
diphtheria in any year in Ilford for the last quarter of a century.
When it is remembered how in the last twenty-four years the
population in Ilford has increased, these figures give considerable
cause for satisfaction. The causes which produce the rise and fall
of epidemics in infectious disease are still very imperfectly understood,
but these cannot altogether explain such a result in a nonepidemic
year. The high percentage of cases of diphtheria treated
in the isolation hospital, their early diagnosis by medical practitioners,
the employment of the services of a nose and throat
surgeon during the past few years to attempt to free "carriers"
of their infecting organisms, and an active School Medical Service,
have all been factors in the result. It will be noted that the
death-rate from diphtheria in Ilford last year was one-twelfth
of that in London.
The infant mortality rate in Ilford shows a slight rise in
common with that which occurred generally in England, although
fortunately it was less marked in Ilford. This was coincident
with a fall in the birth-rate. In Ilford there were 4 less deaths of
babies, but 170 less births. For the infant mortality rate to have
remained the same as in 1923 there should have been seven less
deaths of babies. Measles was epidemic in Ilford in 1924, and
five deaths of children under one year of age occurred from this
cause, while none occurred in 1923. It may, therefore, be presumed
that in another year the rate will again be lowered. We