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10
The most important column in the Age Table is that which
s assigned to the deaths of infants under five years. These
have constituted during the nine months to which the Table
refers, 42.14 per cent. of the total mortality. In the Metropolis
generally the proportion is about 43.2 per cent.; so that notwithstanding
the circumstances already referred to as tending
to increase the infantile mortality in the north District, the
comparison is still favourable. It is upon infancy not only
that the vitiated atmosphere of towns exercises its strongest
influence, but that the want of proper nourishment and of the
necessaries of life, and all that load of suffering which is the
consequence of destitution, press most heavily. Hence it
may be readily understood that the diseases of early infancy
afford the best possible guide in forming an opinion concerning
the sanitary condition of a district. The frequency and
fatality of the affections of adults are liable to be diminished
or increased by a variety of accidental circumstances which it
is extremely difficult to appreciate; as for example, the price
of provisions, the abundance or scarcity of employment, &c.
Infants, on the other hand, are necessarily subject to little
variation in the external conditions by which they are
surrounded. Being constantly at home, they are influenced to
a much greater extent than adults by overcrowding, and other
local causes of unhealthiness.
In a Table which will be found on page 13, the infantile
mortality during the last nine months has been further analysed.
It will there be seen that the principal causes of death among
infants under five years are measles, hooping cough, diarrhoea
and acute diseases of the chest. Respecting the first two it
may be observed that they are complaints which, under favourable
circumstances, are rarely fatal; and that it may be consequently
inferred if an unusual number of deaths occur from
them in any particular locality, that local causes are at work of
such a nature as to require our interference. In regard to the
acute affections of the chest in infants, I may appeal to such
of you as are practitioners of medicine in the support of the