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and Whooping Cough became notifiable from the 1st October. The
number of cases of measles reported to the Department from various
sources during the year numbered 2,415, of which 387 were removed
to hospital and 6 proved fatal. Visits were paid by the Health
Visitors to the homes of measles cases with a view to ensuring that
the children were receiving proper care and attention, and nurses
from the Hackney District Nursing Association, under an arrangement
with the Borough Council, paid 1,622 visits to 140 cases.
With the outbreak of war in the following year many of the
children in the Borough were evacuated, and during the next few
years this evacuation was reflected in the reduction in the notifications
of infectious diseases common among children.
The end of the war in 1945 brought about an increase in the
work of the Department which continued until 1948 and was due
to the necessity for keeping under observation contacts, mainly
returning Service personnel and displaced persons from typhusinfected
areas overseas.
It is interesting to note that in 1947 the first case of Typhus
in Hackney since 1906 was notified and that one of the Council's
cyanide chambers was used for the disinfestation of 13 ambidances
which carried typhus cases or suspected cases to the London County
Council Fever Hospital selected for this purpose.
This year also saw an increase in the number of cases of Poliomyelitis,
when 39 were notified and precautionary measures taken
included spraying with a germicidal solution several times daily
the offices in the Town Hall frequented by the general public, and
the Central and branch libraries. Static water tanks containing
water were sprayed with crude oil containing D.D.T. and dried
out tanks containing refuse and bomb sites throughout the Borough
were sprayed with D.D.T. The action taken was directed more
towards any danger from flies, and the spraying of the Town Hall
and libraries was adopted with a view to allaying the fears of the
public that those buildings might be a source of infection rather
than from any fear that they were in fact a source of infection.
There had been previous cases of poliomyelitis notified in Hackney,
varying from one to seven per year, with seven in 1935 being the
highest number, but in 1947 the disease assumed minor epidemic
proportions and was prevalent in all parts of the country.
Between 1947 and 1948 an outbreak of Cholera in Egypt
necessitated a number of contacts reaching England from that
country being kept under observation but fortunately none of the
contacts under surveillance in Hackney developed the disease.
In 1948 four cases of Typhoid Fever were notified, two of
them being particularly interesting as it was ascertained that the