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94
I shall satisfy myself therefore with placing
before you in a collective form the various facts
with respect to the prevalence of small pox in
Camberwell and its several districts, which I have
from time to time brought under your notice, and
with which also I have furnished the Royal Commission.
These facts prove, as I think, conclusively
that, whatever good the Deptford Hospital has
done us by receiving in large proportion our small
pox cases, it has unfortunately done us more
harm than good, by causing continued outbreaks of
small pox in its immediate neighbourhood at times
when small pox had almost died out elsewhere,
and by aggravating the local incidence of the
disease in a remarkable degree during times in
which the disease has been prevailing epidemically
in London.
Since the opening of the Hospital for the
reception of small pox cases, small pox has never
ceased to prevail in a greater or less degree in
No. 4 Ward, and at times its prevalence has been
almost appalling—notably in the spring of 1879,
and in the early part, and again at the end,
of 1881.