On infantile mortality, and the establishment of hospitals for sick children : read before the Dublin Obstetrical Society, January 8th, 1859 / by William Moore.

  • Moore, William, M.D.
Date:
1859
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On infantile mortality, and the establishment of hospitals for sick children : read before the Dublin Obstetrical Society, January 8th, 1859 / by William Moore. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    show that nearly 26 per cent, of all born perish before the end of the fifth year, and that in London, before the attainment of the 10th year, 35 per cent, perish. In Scotland, the mortality under 5 years of age, with reference to the general mortality, constitutes an average of 40 per cent. ; and in Liverpool, at the same early age, a generation is nearly half exhausted. Of all born amongst the better classes, it has been ascertained that from 25 to 30 per cent, perish under 10 years of age ; 30 to 40 per cent, amongst the lower classes ; and under epidemic influences or other un- favourable circumstances, from 60 to 70 per cent, perish in the same limit of years. Of 14,450 boys, existing under 5 years of age, 2087 died in Liverpool in a single year ; of 14,045 boys in the rural parts of the county of Surrey, only 699 died in the same lapse of time. In a statistical notice of the town and parish of Cheltenham,by Richard Beamish,Esq., F.R.S., he says, “ The large number of deaths during infancy (as exhi- bited to the eye by this table) marks in the strongest manner the lamentable amount of ignorance which continues to prevail amongst females on the vital sub- ject of physiology ; high and low, rich and poor, are alike amenable to those laws which govern our physi- cal nature, and here we find out of an average of 732 deaths, 146 on an average perish before they attain 1 year or 20 per cent., while of those who never reach 5 years, about one-third perish. * Of all classes in the eight principal towns in Scotland, about 46'50, or nearly half, die before the completion of their fifth year : this fact is obtained from the published reports of the Registrar-General for Scotland ; in Perth, in 1856, only 32 per cent, of the persons who perished during the year were under 5 years of age ; in Aberdeen, 35 ‘5 ; in Edinburgh, Edinburgh Medical Journal, May, 1856.