On the mortality of London hospitals : and incidentally on the deaths in the prisons and public institutions of the metropolis / by William A. Guy.

  • Guy, William A. (William Augustus), 1810-1885.
Date:
[1867]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the mortality of London hospitals : and incidentally on the deaths in the prisons and public institutions of the metropolis / by William A. Guy. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    1. That there is a very great clifFerenee between the highest and lowest number of deaths in the London prisons, whether we eom- pare 1861 with 1864, or 1861-62 with 1864-65. 2. That no snch sudden increase in the number of deaths as occurred in London prisons in 1864, took place in those institutions in the seventeen years 1850 to 1866, though the deaths recorded in the cholera year, 1854, were more numerous. 3. That the high prison mortality of 1864 was the climax of an unbroken increase in the number of deaths from the year 1859, when they were at their minimum. 4. That the number of deaths in the years 1865 and 1866, though less than in 1864, were still maintained at a high level. 5. That the figures contahied in Tables VI and Vlll, and in the table just given, justify the opinion that the sudden increase of deaths in 1864, and the large death-rates of 1865-66, may be chiefly due to the prevalence of one or more diseases of the lungs. 6. That as in the case of hospitals and asylums for the aged, the disease of the lungs which occasions the high mortality of certain years, is most probably bronchitis, so in the case of the younger population of prisons, is pulmonary consumption the most probable cause of the excess. If this opinion be well founded, it ought to be possible to prove— 1. That, in seasons of unusual severity, deaths from pulmonary consumption undergo a sudden and marked increase; 2, that the year 1864, and, in a less degree, the years following, were seasons of exceptional severity; and 3, that pulmonary consumption pre- vails among ]3risoners to such an extent, and with such consider- able fluctuations, as to explain, at least in part, such differences as those which mark the years 1863 and 1864. 1. That no doubt may exist as to the influence of seasons of unusual severity in increasing the deaths by consumption and other diseases of the lungs, I will adduce certain conclusive numerical statements of the Registrar-General. Between ten cold and . ten warm days in the months of November and December, 1856, there was a difference of about 20° Fahr., and the deaths from the diseases in question increased as follows:— Ten Ten Percentage Increase Warm Days. Cold Days. of Deaths. Pulmonary consumption 163 232 42 Bronchitis and other diseases of the lungs .... 394 502 27 2. The unusual severity of the winters of the last three years, and its relation to the increased mortality, are clearly shown by the following extracts from the Registrar-General’s summaries of the weekly returns for the years 1864, 1865, and 1866. Of the first of these years the Registrar-General, writing in 1865, says, “ The “ death-rate was not so high as it was last year in any of the pre- “ ceding twenty-four years, except 1847, the influenza year,” “ and “ 1849 and 1854, the two cholera years.” “ The mean temperature “ of the air was below the average of twenty-three years in seven