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9.
1. INFECTIOUS DISEASES
DIPHTHERIA.
A serious outbreak of diphtheria occurred in January,
serious not only because one child lost her life and four
others contracted the disease, but because a total of 74
carriers were found whose indentificaticn and surveillance
involved a tremendous amount of work and disruption of
school programmes.
Three schools were affected; Sidney Chaplin Secondary
Modern, and Roger Ascham Junior and Infants Schools, and
over ten thousand swabs were taken involving nineteen
sessions at the schools and hundreds of home visits.
All the child carriers (66) were admitted to hospital
for treatment and lost many weeks schooling while
absenteeism amounted at one time to 40%, some parents
urging school closure because of fear of infection.
In fact, the epidemic, which is fully described in my
report as Medical officer of Health, was well controlled
and confined to the two departments of Roger Ascham School
and to families living in the vicinity. (No school spread
occurred from the single case at Sidney Chaplin School.)
It was usual to find four, five or even six members
of a family infected and it is clear that most of the
spread occurred in the homes rather than at the schools,
both of which had an immunity index of about 70%.
The following tables show, however, that such spread
as occurred in the schools was related to the presence of
cases, rather than carriers in the class affected. This
was to be expected since the concentration of diphtheria
bacilli is enormously higher in the vicinity of a case
where the germs are actively multiplying in the nose and
throat.