[Report 1932] / Medical Officer of Health, Bristol.

  • Bristol (England). Council.
Date:
1932
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: [Report 1932] / Medical Officer of Health, Bristol. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    5/248 (page 5)
    .'J BRISTOL PORT SANITARY AUTHORITY. ANNUAL REPORT, 1932. My Lord Mayor, Ladies and Gentlemen, I have the honour to present to you a report upon the work ol the Port Sanitary Authority during the year 1932. During another year the officers of the department have carried out their duties successfully. In spite of the dose contact which the port has with countries where acute infectious diseases such as cholera, plague, or smallpox are frequent, no cases of an acute infectious nature appeared in the city or district during the year. This is no mere matter of ‘ good fortune ’ but it has necessitated continuous vigilance on the part of the responsible officers night and day. Ships from ‘ infected ’ or suspicious ports have been carefully inspected on arrival at the port and kept under observation whilst in port. As mentioned in previous reports, the results may not be very outstanding on paper as they are mostly negative, but the preventive work done at this port is of the first importance not only to the port and city but also to the whole country. Particular attention is drawn to the following :— 1. s.s. “ Caduceus ” arrived Avonmouth with a case sus- picious of plague on board (p. 12). 2. s.s. “Marouka Pateras ” arrived Avonmouth with a considerable number of dead rats on board (p. 19). 3. Contamination of a cargo of mutton and lamb with arsenic (p. 20). During the 3'ear under review, 980 ships arrived at Bristol ports from “foreign” countries and 5,838 from coastwise, making a total from “foreign” and coastwise of 6,818. Of these ships, 31 were from ports known to have been infected by plague. Your medical officers visited 250 ships altogether and in nearly all these examined the crews. This compares with 285 ships visited during 1931. The port sanitary inspectors boarded 2,424 ships. The number of cases of sickness landed from vessels arriving at the port was 150, in addition 07 ca.scs of infectious and other sickness were reported to have occurred on vessels during the voyage, but had been disjiosed of prior to arrival. There was no case or suspected ca.se of yellow fever, smallpox or typhus on board the.se vessels. Twelve cases were removed from ships to the isolation hospital for observation or treatment.