London's Pulse: Medical Officer of Health reports 1848-1972
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Hints from the Health Department. Leaflet from the archive of the Society of Medical Officers of Health. Credit: Wellcome Collection, London
Whitechapel 1876
[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for Whitechapel]
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6
The deaths from small-pox in London for the Quarter have been 110;
and the weekly returns, since the 30th September, have been respectively 11,
16, 22,15, 21, 48, and 52. The deaths in the corresponding Quarter of 1870,
when the great epidemic of small-pox (1871-2) commenced, were 146. The
weekly return, as given by the Registrar-General, was as follows: 13, 11, 15,
11, 15, 10, 11, 9, 12, 11, 15, 13. The deaths continued to increase weekly, thus,
27, 13, 17, 21, 23, 40, 45, 41, 60, 61, 44, 82, and for the week ending December
31st, they were 110, and continued to increase until the week ending July 1st,
1871, when they reached the culminating point; the number of deaths being
235; after which they gradually declined, and on the week ending 7th September,
1872, they were only 6. The total deaths from small-pox in London
for the year 1870, were 958, and in the two following years they were respectively
7834 and 1532. The gradual rise, culmination, and gradual decline
of epidemic diseases is not satisfactorily explained.
Vaccination.
WHITECHAPEL UNION.—Return of the number of Cases Vaccinated by the Public Vaccinator and the Medical Officer of the Workhouse, together with the number of Births Registered during the same quarters.
| Quarter ending— | PUBL1C VACCINATOR | Workhouse. | Totals. | Births Registd. | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Primary Cases. | Re-Vacci-nation. | Primary Cases. | Re-Vaccination | Primary Cases.* | Re-Vaccination. | ||
| December, 1874 | 185 | 2 | 31 | 0 | 216 | 2 | 689 |
| March, 1875 | 292 | 2 | 44 | 0 | 336 | 2 | 687 |
| June | 376 | 0 | 26 | 0 | 402 | 0 | 673 |
| September, | 350 | 1 | 35 | 0 | 385 | 1 | 650 |
| December | 178 | 2 | 23 | 0 | 201 | 2 | 655 |
| March, 1876 | 236 | 0 | 25 | 0 | 261 | 0 | 722 |
| June | 369 | 0 | 36 | 0 | 405 | 0 | 684 |
| September | 354 | 0 | 40 | 0 | 394 | 0 | 644 |
| Totals | 2340 | 7 | 260 | 0 | 2600 | 7 | 5404 |
Shall Pox.
The Registrar-General, in his weekly returns, having drawn public
attention to the prevalence of small-pox in the Metropolis, and having
stated that a large proportion of the deaths from this disease have occurred
among those who have not been vaccinated, I deemed it to be my duty to
direct the attention of your Board to the fact that, not only is small-pox
unusually prevalent in the Metropolis, but so also is scarlet-fever; the deaths
from the former disease having been during the Quarter 110, and from the