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REPORT FOR 1880.
The extreme prevalence of Small Pox in Hackney during
the last ten years, the outbreak again in 1880, after a very
limited period of cessation, the great number of cases and
the excessive death rate amongst the inhabitants of the
streets in the vicinity of the Homerton Small Pox Hospital,
induced me to very carefully investigate again, the important
question of the influence, if any, on the public health of the
district, exercised by the Small Pox Hospital. I therefore
collected together all the cases reported to me during the
ten years, and re-examined the returns of the District
Registrars for the same period, to ascertain the number of
deaths, and distributed them amongst the streets and places
where the cases and deaths occurred. I have not been able
to ascertain the whole of the residences of those who died in
hospitals in 1871, but I have done so to a very great extent,
so that the tables appended to this Report, whilst fairly
representing the whole District, certainly do not overestimate
the deaths in the streets occupied by the poorer
classes, especially in the vicinity of the Hospital.
The increased attention recently bestowed on all infectious
diseases, especially as regards their prevention, has probably
led many to suppose that the mortality in the Metropolis of
late years has been something unprecedented. As this is
not the case, I now lay before you a few figures respecting
the disease in previous centuries, and also a tabular statement
of the annual number of deaths from small pox in
London per 100,000 population, since the year 1837. These
figures show, as I pointed out several years since, that from
1841 to 1872, inclusive, each epidemic period lasted for
4 years, with two exceptions, viz., for the years 1861, 1862
and 1863, which formed one epidemic period, and the other
for 1868—72, which was one year longer than usual. The
cause of this tendency to what may be termed a wave lasting
for four years in London, cannot be definitely stated, but I