[Report 1954] / School Medical Officer of Health, Anglesey County Council.

  • Anglesey (Wales). County Council. no2003102100.
Date:
1954
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: [Report 1954] / School Medical Officer of Health, Anglesey County Council. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    or influenzal pneumonia” were mentioned on the death certificate as the main or as a contributory cause of death, whereas there were no such deaths during the same period the previous years. Of the 11 deaths, two were of people in their 60’s, 5 were between 70 and 80, and 4 were over 80 years of age. During the last quarter of 1953 there were no notifications of pneumonia” or influenzal pneumonia” occurring, but during the same period in 1954 there were 5 such notifications. School Attendcmce ■. The way in which the epidemic affected school attendance may be seen from the following table, which compares attendances in primary and secondary schools for the Autumn Term of 1953 with that of the Autumn Term of 1954. The secondary schools were affected to a greater extent than the primary schools: TABLE I. Attendance during term as % of possible. Autumn Autumn 1953 1954 Primary 91.7 87.3 Secondary 92.9 86.7 AU schools 92.2 87.1 The attendance records of individual schools were examined for the period from 25th October—when the schools re-assembled after a mid-term break of one week—to the 17th December when the Christmas holiday commenced. From these records it is possible to establish the manner in which the epidemic progressed throughout the county. This is shown in the maps in Fig II. As each school was affected (i.e., its attendance fell to 80 per cent, or below in any given week) the school and its catchment area are indicated on the map. It will be seen from these maps that the epidemic appeared in several places in the southern and eastern part of the county in the first week or two, and from there it spread to the remaining parts of the county but left a few pockets which were not affected at all. Did the epidemic lose its virulence as time progressed ? If a line is drawn from just west of Aberffraw to west of Amlwch, the county is divided into roughly equal areas. To the east of this line— the area affected in the early period of the epidemic—there is only one unaffected school out of 37 schools in all, whereas to the west of this line there are 7 unaffected schools out of a total of 25 schools. (The difference is statistically significant. Chi-squared equals 8.49 and