[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for Southwark].

  • St. George the Martyr (Southwark, London, England). Parish Council.
Date:
1881
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)

Credit: [Report of the Medical Officer of Health for Southwark]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: City of London, London Metropolitan Archives

    10/53 (page 11)
    Annual Report of the Medical Officer of Health—1880—81. 11 closing of the Queen's Bench Prison, and by the Metropolitan Board of Works having closed many of the houses in the Green Street area, and also in the Mint; and I trust it will not be long before these areas are completely demolished, and decent houses erected in their place, but not Industrial dwellings. The Death rate therefore has been 22—2, which is the same as that given by the Registrar General for the whole of London; so that I think we can compare] favourably with the neighbouring Parishes. The Death rate in the first quarter of the year for the whole of London was 21—8. So low a Death rate in a corresponding quarter has not been recorded since 1856. This is the more remarkable on account of the exceptionally severe frosts that prevailed during the greater part of January, and also an exceptionally heavy fall of snow. We have a right to infer that this low death rate is in some measure due to the sanitary efforts of the last few years, especially so when it is borne in mind that the natural tendency of any large Parish if left to itself is not to become healthier, but to deteriorate, owing to the increasing density of its population, and the consequent increasing pollution of the air; and we cannot help looking with anxiety as to the result of massing a large number of human beings in the huge buildings which are being built near us. TABLE No. 1. Years 187 -2 1872-3 1873-1 1874-5 1875-6 1876-7 1877-8 1 8789 1879-80 1880-1 Deaths 1444 1119 1256 1287 1393 1206 1283 1424 1345 1256 Excess of Births 499 997 828 880 777 893 900 829 916 967 The principal diseases of the Respiratory organs, viz : Bronchitis and Pneumonia, caused 168 and 84 deaths respectively, of those 152 were under five years, and 122 over fifty, showing that thesa diseases appear most fatal at the extremes of life. TABLE No. 2. 1875-6 1876-7 1877-8 1879-80 1880-81 Bronchitis 192 181 186 260 168 Pneumonia 94 73 76 73 84