Dr. Thorne Thorne's report to the local government board on the circumstances attending an extensive diffusion of scarlet fever in Great Massingham and other villages in the Freebridge Lynn Rural Sanitary District, and on certain points relating to the sanitary administration of the district.

  • Thorne, R. Thorne (Richard Thorne), Sir, 1841-1899.
Date:
1877
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Dr. Thorne Thorne's report to the local government board on the circumstances attending an extensive diffusion of scarlet fever in Great Massingham and other villages in the Freebridge Lynn Rural Sanitary District, and on certain points relating to the sanitary administration of the district. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service. The original may be consulted at London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service.

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    Great Massingham a second time, in order, according to a communication which they addressed to the Local Government Board, “ to report if danger of infection ” had passed away. Then followed the frequent recurrence of scarlet fever cases in Grimstone throughout 1876, and the extensive diffusion of the disease as an epidemic in that village, in Great Massingham, and in other parts of the district during the past winter. No action whatever was however taken by the Authority to stay the spread of the disease in any portion of the district during the whole of that period, notwithstanding the fact that its prevalence was frequently brought under their notice in numerous ways, as by occasional references to it in the report hook of the inspector of nuisances, entries and special notes on the returns of pauper sickness, and in one instance, by means of a special communication from a practitioner in King’s Lynn as to the outbreak at South Wootton. Beyond the fact that this latter communication was immediately forwarded by the Clerk to the Chairman of the Sanitary Authority, and laid before the Authority more than three weeks after, at the same time as an erroneous statement of the inspector of nuisances to the effect that the outbreak had subsided, nothing whatever appears to have been done with regard to any portion of this widely spread epidemic until May 1877. On the 5th of that month the rector of Great Massingham, acting on behalf of himself and other residents of the parish, wrote to the Sanitary Authority and expressed the opinion that the village ought to he carefully inspected by the medical officer of health “in order to ascertain, if possible, the cause of the recurrence “ and continuance of the epidemic.” On the following day a special meeting of the Sanitary Authority was held for purposes other than the consideration of the epidemic in the district, and in view of the rector’s communication the “ medical officer of health” was requested to undertake “the necessary inspection,” and to report on the matter at the next meeting on the 18th of M^y. The report was to the effect that upwards of 100 cases of scarlet fever had occurred in Great Massingham, that other villages were infected, and the district was stated to constitute “a source of contagion “ to the whole of the western division of the county.” These three visits to Great Massingham constitute the work of the medical officer of health for the Preebridge Lynn Sanitary District for nearly three years. With regard to the duties of the inspector of nuisances, it is quite obvious from the condition in which I found Great Massingham, that the efficiency as to nuisance- removal to which the Authority bore testimony in May 1874 had long since ceased. Not only was this officer quite ignorant as to many of the gross nuisances prevailing in the village, but several of the inhabitants who made loud complaint as to the conditions of filth by which their houses were surrounded, had clearly no idea that there was any officer to whom they could appeal in the matter. Prom January 1875 to May 1877 there are 50 entries in the inspector’s report book relating to Great Massingham; four of them, made at different intervals, are to the effect that there were “ no nuisances ” in the place, or that the parish was “in a satisfactory state,” and most cf the remainder relate to privy nuisances, some of which, reported as far back as from six to eighteen months ago, were still in existence at the date of my inspection. The inspector of nuisances in question appears to be an intelligent officer, and with regard to the great neglect which characterises that portion of his district which I visited, it should be noted, 1st, that an important portion of his time is taken up with his work as relieving officer; 2nd, that he has never received any instructions as to the duties he was expected to perform in his capacity as inspector of nuisances; and 3rd, that when serious nuisances were reported, and again reported, by him to the Sanitary Authority, no action whatever was at times taken concerning them. Since mention has been made in another part of this Report to a prevalence of scarlet fever in King’s Lynn, it may be well by way of contrast to refer to the sanitary administration of that borough with regard to infectious disease. Prom information supplied to me it appears that the urban sanitary authority have arranged to pay a fee to the poor law medical officers practising within their district each time that they report the existence of a case of infectious disease to their medical officer of health, and that information thus acquired is invariably supplemented, as indeed was the case formerly in the Preebridge Lynn District, by reports of a similar character, which are voluntarily forwarded to the same officer by private medical practitioners. By such means the officers of the Authority were informed of all the cases of scarlet fever which appeared in King’s Lynn during the period of the recent epidemics in the Preebridge Lynn Union. The houses affected were at once visited by the medical officer