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It is important to note, as showing its highly infectious nature
now rapidly the disease spreads in Streets forming a cul de sac.
It has been shown that the total mortality from Small Pox in
Lambeth, including deaths in Stockwell Hospital, was 371, that
of these, 150 were strangers to Lambeth, and in 121 cases the
patients died at their homes, the greater number of these deaths
occurring in the latter half of the year. The difficulty as regards
Hospital accommodation was identically the same as in the Epidemic
of 1871.
The present plan of providing large permanent Hospitals for
the isolation and treatment of infectious Fevers admitted from all
parts of the Metropolis, appears to be wrong in principle, and one
which calls for an immediate remedy. As it is probable that
the Asylums Board will soon be invested with powers to
provide Hospital accommodation for both classes, it is to be hoped
that it will direct its attention to providing a separate Hospital
for each parish, or so arrange such accommodation as to prevent
the necessity for the great risk and danger, not only to the
patients themselves, but to the community at large, in drafting
these cases from one Parish to the other through the crowded
thoroughfares. If a Parish be treated separately, as regards
Hospital accommodation for this class of disease, there would be
no difficulty in estimating its requirements, as each Epidemic of
Small Pox under the present administration of the Vaccination
Laws, must of necessity become less severe. A Hospital of 100
beds, allowing an additional 20 for quarantine and convalescent
wards, would probably suffice for the future requirements of Lambeth,
with its increase of population.
The greatest number of Lambeth cases under treatment in the
different Metropolitan Hospitals in any one week was 121, the
largest number in Stockwell Hospital being 81.