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9
MEDICAL OFFICER'S REPORT.
Gentlemen,
It is my duty and privilege for the eighteenth time to submit
for your information the annual statistics bearing upon the health,
mortality, and sanitary work in connection with the St. Saviour's
Board of Works; and in order to render the facts so revealed
more intelligible to those who can only give such Tables the time
necessary for a cursory glance, I venture, as I have hitherto done,
to summarise their contents.
It will be observed that the number of Deaths in the District is in
excess of that of the previous year; but although there is an increase,
it is not exceptionally large, as the total number registered is
below the average of several previous years. The mortality for
the whole District for 1873 was 759, but as the number of Births
was 1102, an addition of 343 to the population—the mortality
must so far be regarded in the light of the almost invariable law of
proportion of Deaths to the number of persons living. Of the
number of Deaths recorded, 337 were persons under 20 years of age
and 31 passed the age of 80. This latter number is augmented by
the residence in the Christchurch Workhouse of aged people admitted
from two other Districts.
The Annual Report of the Registrar-General not having been
issued at the date of this Report, I am unable to make any comparison
between your District and that of London and its four
great Divisions, but my impression from the weekly Records is,
that in a sanitary point of view, such a comparison would not be
unfavourable to its present condition.
Although the Tables exhibit an increase of nine Deaths from
Epidemic Diseases, it is a pleasing fact that no case of Death
occurred from that terrible scourge, Small-pox. This state of
things should be sufficient to encourage those who arc interested
in the practice of Vaccination. There is, however, a lingering
prejudice against its operation, which can only be overcome by the
steady and persistent perseverance of those whose duty it is to
enforce the existing laws in reference to this matter, and I am