[Report 1905] / Medical Officer of Health, Aberdeen City.

  • Aberdeen (Scotland). City Council.
Date:
1905
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: [Report 1905] / Medical Officer of Health, Aberdeen City. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    17/48 (page 15)
    sary, but it is astonishing how persons of average health will quickly become habituated to the colder but fresher room, and feel stimulated and exhilarated by it, and will be surprised to find how much more rarely they suffer from colds, and how much their health is improved generally. Even weak people, such as bed-ridden consumptives, can lie in the coldest days and nights of winter with their beds across a widely open window and suffer no harm, but, on the contrary, derive remarkable benefit. There are, of course, a few persons who from peculiarity of constitution or illness cannot stand the cool air of a well-ventilated room, but they are far fewer than is generally believed. Fresh air in the office or workshop, fresh air in the sitting-room and kitchen, and fresh air in the sleeping-room ought to be the aim of every person, and especially of young men and women. It is the sovereign preventive of the greatest pestilence of adolescence—consumption. I would only suggest further in regard to persons of adolescent age—and the suggestion is simply an extension of the observation just made—that every young man and woman whose occupation is sedentary or confined, should make a point of securing daily some out-door exercise or recreation—walking, cycling, football, cricket, golf, rowing, fishing—it matters little which, so long as it takes them into the open air and keeps their muscles in play. It should be regarded as a duty, and not merely as a pleasure or a pastime. The age of adolescence is one at which the seeds of future illness are often sown. There is no period of life at which thoughtful and intelligent care of the body will be so amply rewarded in subsequent health. Young people are so buoyant and often so reckless of their store of health that they too frequently impose on it heavy mortgages that can never after- wards be liquidated. If they would be careful as to what they cat, and avoid hurried eating and irregular meal-liours, if they would not be heedless of colds and minor ailments, remembering that these, if neglected, may lay the foundations of a serious illness, and if they would always appreciate the supreme value of fresh air, they would more often enjoy a healthy, vigorous manhood, and prolong their lives. Mortality at “ Mature ” Aye-Period (25-60 years).—The death-rate (10 6 per 1,000) at this age-period last year was the lowest on record. It is interesting to note that this rate, which stood at an average of 18'7 in the ten years 1866-75, fell rapidly in the next five years to between 12 and 13. Since about 18S0 up to and inclusive of 1902—that is, for about twenty years—it continued at from 12 to 13. But in 1903 it fell to 118, in 1904 to 11-1, and in 1905 to 106. This is a gratifying decline in the mortality at the most useful and productive of all the age-periods, and it is too large to be wholly explained away by an error in the population on which the rate has been estimated, such as I referred to at the commencement of the report. It is difficult to say what the causes of the decline may be. Perhaps we are beginning to reap, at this age, the benefits of the more stringent application in recent years by the Sanitary Department and the Factory Inspector of the laws applicable to the sanitary con- dition of workshops and factories, as also the benefits of the large clearances of slum property in the centre of the city. Mortality at “Post-Mature” Age-Period (60 years and upward*).—The death-rate (616 per 1,000) at this, the latest of the age-periods, is also the lowest on record. Here also the fall is especially marked within the last three years, and is probably due to the same causes as have been operative at the preceding age-period. It is satisfactory to find that practically every age-period has shared in the fall of the general death-rate.