[Report 1950] / Medical Officer of Health, Tipton Borough.

Tipton (England : Parish). Borough Council.

Date:: 1950

Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: [Report 1950] / Medical Officer of Health, Tipton Borough. Source: Wellcome Collection.

16/44 (page 14)

During 1950 Scarlet Fever shov^ed a higher incidence than usual. Not since 1945 has the disease been so prevalent. Most of the cases were of a mild nature and no deaths occurred. Only one case of diphtheria occurred and unfortunately the child died. The illness was complicated by whooping cough. The child had not been immunised. Twenty cases of Poliomyelitis occurred and there were four deaths. This was the first outbreak which had visited the borough and coincided with a fairly general high incidence of the disease throughout the country. The incidence of measles was low compared with the three previous years as Table 9 shows. The incidence of pneumonia was low, 19 cases, in fact the lowest for many years, but 14 of these died and 1 made comment on this high fatality rate in my annual report for 1949 in which year 16 out of 24 cases died. Tuberculosis. The decline in the number of new cases notified for 1950 is entirely in the non-pulmonary category, although last year saw a drop in the notifications of pulmonary disease to 43. Several cases of tuberculosis have been dealt with by the House Letting Committee as special cases for rehousing, and in 16 instances tuberculous patients and their families have been rehoused in Council houses with a separate bedroom for the patient. In three cases a lodger family has been rehoused as providing the better solution of the overcrov/ding problem.