Annual report of the Medical Department / Uganda Protectorate.

  • Uganda Protectorate. Medical Department.
Date:
[1951]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Annual report of the Medical Department / Uganda Protectorate. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    21/92 (page 15)
    B. Nutrition and Food Supplies The year 1951 provided surprises both in its weather and in the occurrence of nutritional defects. The first six months were dry, leading to local food shortages in the Northern Province; the second six months were unusually turbulent, with hurricanes during September in the western part of the Protectorate and unparalleled rainfall figures for the year, generally favouring crops and producing record yields of sorghum in Kigezi. Vitamin deficiencies are noted most frequently in residential institutions such as boarding schools and prisons. They were recorded at widely separated parts of the country during the year, from the West Nile and Karamoja in the north to Kampala on the shores of Lake Victoria. The deficiencies appeared to be precipitated by the failure to obtain some normal component which was an essential accessory to the main diet. It has proved extremely difficult to maintain an adequate institutional diet. Although vitamin A deficiency was well recognised in Luzira Prison a quarter of a century ago, and although an adequate dietary scale was laid down when new Prisons legislation was introduced in 1944, cases again occurred in the prison during 1951. It is estimated that 10% of prisoners have some degree of vitamin deficiency on admission, and residence in prison may precipitate the onset of clinical symptoms. In Moroto, five cases of scurvy and night-blindness with one death were noted among remand prisoners who do not work out of doors and who do not have the opportunity afforded to other prisoners of supplementing their diet with antiscorbutic fruits and vegetables. These occurrences have led to a review of prison diets, aimed at reducing the risk of vitamin deficiencies. There is no lack of rich sources of both vitamins A and C in Uganda. Sweet potatoes, certain native vegetables and the large sweet pepper (Capsicum annuum variety grossum) are available to provide the former, while citrus fruits and green vegetables in general provide the latter. Evidence of vitamin B complex deficiency is rare; examples are seen occasionally, although an obvious dietary defect is not always demonstrable. An interesting outbreak of suspected pellagra was noted at a leprosy settle¬ ment, the skin lesions appearing at the site of intra-dermal injections given to patients on a maize diet. Another small outbreak of 38 cases occurred in the mental hospital after maize had been substituted for plantains for less than six weeks. \ Further progress has been made in the study of protein requirements, particularly of young children. The clinical condition resulting from a relative lack of protein after weaning is now commonly known as “kwashi¬ orkor”. It has been shown by workers at Mulago Hospital, where staff trom Makerere College and the Medical Research Council have been collaborating with Government specialists, that the deficiency causes physiological changes which accentuate the mal-absorption of food. The