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SCARLET FEVER.
The deaths from Scarlet Fever in the borough were 35 during 1907,
as against 45 for the year 1906, and 28 for 1905.
In this borough Scarlet Fever of late appears to have had a cycle
of five years. The disease reached its height of prevalency in 1897,
1901, and 1906 We may, therefore, expect to see the decline, which
commenced in 1907, continuing for the next few years, until a fresh and
more susceptible population has arisen. The increase in certain years
of this and similar infectious diseases cannot be due to want of care in
the removal of the sick from the healthy, nor from any failure in the
way of disinfection, or other preventive measures. With our present
knowledge it can simply be said that in certain years these complaints
spread in spite of all sanitary activity, whilst at other times no
amount of fostering, even if that were tried, would produce a fairly respectable
epidemic. It has not yet been explained why we have these
seasonal outbursts. It is the same in all similar complaints whether
small-pox, measles, whooping cough, and the host of diseases we are
accustomed to associate with infancy. I think it must be admitted that
when epidemic disease breaks out in a family where the house accommodation
is very limited it is a good and reasonable thing to remove the child
affected to hospital so as to prevent contact with other and healthy
members of the family. In this borough the removal of so many
children suffering from Scarlet Fever to the hospitals of the Metropolitan
Asylums Board has certainly been coincident with the increasing mildness
of the disease one has noticed for so many years. The malignant
form of the disease pretty common twenty-five years ago, when few had
other than home treatment, may be said to have disappeared. It has
been stated that hospitals for Scarlet Fever have not quite fulfilled their
mission, inasmuch as since their existence the number of cases of the
disease has not materially diminished. Without admitting such to be