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17
The death-rate of the Whitechapel District, as I have hinted
in a previous page, is considerably influenced by the common
lodging-houses within it. These places are under ponce supervision,
they are well-conducted, and very clean. Any case of infectious
disease is at once removed, and the room, as well as the particular
bedding, &c., is at once disinfected. No difficulty is experienced
in this matter, because the police visitors and our own staff work
together to carry out the arrangements I have mentioned. From
a return kindly forwarded to me under the direction of the Chief
Commissioner of Police, by Chief Inspector Cutbush, I find that in
the Whitechapel District there are 149 registered lodging-houses,
licensed to contain a total of 6,136 beds. The normal average
occupation of these rooms probably amounts to considerably less
than the accommodation which is provided, but in attractive
seasons, a sudden stream flows in, and we are then, within a few
days, liable to add very many persons to our population. A
memorable instance of this occurred in the early part of the year,
when the liberality displayed at the Mansion House caused an
immense influx into the District, from all parts of the country, of
persons not in the best condition to withstand the risks of disease.
I have alluded to these lodging-houses as prejudicial to the
District statistically, from a sanitary point of view, and this is selfevident
when we reflect that the people occupying these houses
add proportionately little to our birth-rate, whilst they enormously
increase our sickness and death-rates.
To be precise, the lodging-houses births equal 1.3 per cent. of
the total District births, and 38.4 per cent. of the births of residents
in the Union Infirmary, whilst the deaths in these registered
houses equal 11.9 per cent. of the total District residents' deaths,
and 64.5 per cent. of the total Infirmary deaths. Even if we
assume that the average occupation of these dwellings equals their
power of accommodation, there is then a death-rate of nearly 34
per 1000, referable to them. As a logical outcome of these figures
it may be inferred how largely the sickness-rate is increased by
our possession of these tenements, and how adversely the elements
I have been discussing must influence all our statistics. I am
anxious to draw attention to these items, not to undervalue the
importance of such houses (for to the poor people who lodge in
them they are of the utmost benefit), but rather to emphasize the
c