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27
INFECTIOUS DISEASES, AND MEASURES
TAKEN TO PREVENT THEIR SPREAD.
During the year 657 cases of Infectious Diseases were notified,
exclusive of 43 cases of Chicken Pox. A personal visit was made in
the case of this latter disease in persons over 12 years, owing to the
prevalence of Small Pox in 1902. The compulsory notification of
Chicken Pox was discontinued in January, and the expenditure involved
the previous year was justified and the precaution of the greatest value.
The 657 cases occurred in 505 houses, and a visit was immediately
paid by a Sanitary Inspector, followed by the usual routine of precautionary
and preventive measures in all instances.
Handbills were distributed for the guidance of the householder
where treatment was undertaken at home, and special instructions
issued in the case of Typhoid.
Notification of the illness was at once made to the school authorities,
and the children from the infected houses were prohibited attending
school. Disinfectants, free of charge, were offered to those unable to
purchase them, and isolation and quarantine enforced as far as possible.
The visit of the Sanitary Inspector consisted not only in the giving
of general instructions and obtaining the necessary information as to
milk supply and probable source of infection, but included a systematic
inspection of the house.
Thus, apart from the measures taken against the spread of disease,
the notifications necessitated the thorough inspection of 505 houses,
with the result that 209 defects were remedied that otherwise might
have been overlooked, including 63 of drainage. The householder
and the house are the sanitary units, and when these are made ideal,
the Public Health service will be a sinecure.
In every instance of Diphtheria, removal to the Sanatorium was
offered, and carried out if recommended by the medical attendant, and
a large percentage of those suffering from Scarlet Fever desirous of
hospital accommodation was removed.
In many instances where removal was indicated and necessary, the
limited accommodation provided could not permit of the step.
On the termination of the illness the rooms or house were thoroughly
disinfected by the Council's men, and the clothes and bedding removed
to the disinfecting station for treatment by steam under pressure.
That disinfection would be effective, it is necessary that all clothes
worn by the patient, as well as those exposed to infection, should he