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43
DIARRHŒA.
During 1886 there was an increase in the number of
deaths from Diarrhoea, the number registered being 240,
including 2 strangers, as against 170 in the preceding year.
Diarrhoea caused the death of 238 people during the year.
Of these 208 occurred in children under 5 years of age, and
the remaining 30 being spread through the various age
periods,no special periods have a marked incidence; 159
of the deaths of children took place in the first year of life,
and 200 of the total deaths took place in the six hotter
months of the year. Hence we shall be correct in assuming
that fatal diarrhoea, so far as the statistics for the year
go to prove, is an infants' complaint, for the most part having
its incidence in the hot weather. Many people are under the
impression that the increase of mortality from diarrhoea
in the summer is due to the larger consumption of fruit, but
fruit is an exceptional article in the dietary of children in
their first year, and as the majority of deaths occurs during
that period of life, fruit, although it may be a cause of
diarrhoea, is not commonly a cause of fatal diarrhoea.
The summer diarrhoea of children is a specific disease;
the attack is sudden in its onset. Vomiting accompanies
or precedes its incidence. No food is retained, and in many
cases death occurs in twenty-four or forty-eight hours. If,
however, the disease does not prove fatal, it runs its course in
about fourteen days. The cause of this complaint has
been investigated in a large number of cases, and I have
arrived at the conclusion that milk, which has undergone a
fermentive change, is the cause. The preventative measure
which I should recommend to parents, is, that they should
not feed children with milk which has not previously been