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13
INFANT MORTALITY.
By this term is meant the proportion of deaths of children
under one year to the actual number of births registered within
the year, and the result is expressed as deaths per 1,000 of
registered births. If other statistics could be worked out with
such exact data, deductions would be made which ought to he
more useful and lees liable to errors.
The number of infants dying in 1909 in the District are,
curiously, the same as in 1908, viz.: 17. But, owing to there
being in 11)09 a lesser number of births, the proportion is
slightly greater, being 50 per thousand, against 48 in 1908.
The rate is in any case satisfactory, and one which compares
favourably with even the country districts where conditions
tending to make healthy children are more favourable than
in the towns. From my inspection of the children in the
Schools, also in the investigation of epidemic diseases, and the
data supplied to me by your Sanitary Inspector in his house
to house visits in this and past years, as well as his observations
in the houses where infectious diseases have occurred, make me
of the opinion that the causes of this low mortality are: (1)
the care taken by the average Merton mother of her children,
(2) the fairly clean condition of the houses (of course there are
exceptions to both these), (3) the absence of overcrowding, (4) the
reater part of the District being comparatively new, modern
sanitation exists, and care is taken that they are kept in an
efficient state. A large number of houses have passages at. the
back, and this gives opportunities for the early detection and
remedy of nuisances in yards.
In the matter of infant rearing, conditions which are
important are: (a) suitability of food, and in this connection
nothing can in the vast majority of oases take the place of
breast milk in the first year of life: (b) adequate supply of
fresh air; (c) cleanliness in person and surroundings; (d) suitability
of clothing.