Mr. Spear's report to the Local Government Board upon the fatality from "croup", and other throat affections, in the Horwich regestration sub-district / [John Spear].

  • Spear, John.
Date:
[1889]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Mr. Spear's report to the Local Government Board upon the fatality from "croup", and other throat affections, in the Horwich regestration sub-district / [John Spear]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Except for the broad fact that Westhcmghton was affected considerably earlier than the Horwich district no very noticeable incidence of the disease either as to time or place is apparent from this classification. As to family invasions, the main facts in connexion therewith may be thus stated. The 38 fatalities ascribed to “ croup, tracheitis, and laryngitis ” occurred in 35 different households. In 26 of these no other attack of any similar nature (either of croup, laryngitis, diphtheria, or noticeable sore throat), so far as could be discovered, had occurred, although there were living in these 26 house¬ holds some 78 other children or young people. In the remaining nine house¬ holds secondary cases occurred as follows:— 1. February 1887.—Child, aged 4, died from “laryngitis;” four other children of the family suffered about the same time from more or less severe sore throat (no subsequent paralytic symptoms observed). 2. March 1887.—Child suffered from bad sore throat; brother seized few days later and died from “ laryngitis.” 3. September 1887.—Children of same family, aged respectively 3 and li years, died within two days of each other from “ laryngitis.” * 4. November 1887.—One child, aged 3, died from “laryngitis”; another, aged 4, suffered in following week from “ croup.” 5. January L8th, 1888.—Boy, aged 14, died from “laryngitis”; three children of the same family suffered a few days later with similar symptoms.! 6. January 8th, 1888.—Child, aged 3, died from “ diphtheria,” the case being, I was informed by the medical man, quite typical; a sister, aged 2, died on February 25th from what was certified by another practi¬ tioner as “ croup.” X 7. January 12th, 1888.—Child, aged 3, died from “ croup ” ; another, of same family, aged 2, suffered from similar symptoms four days later. § 8. March 11th, 1888.—Child, aged 2, died from “ croup” ; another, of same family, aged 5, died on 5th October following, the death being ascribed to the same cause. 9. August 13th, 1888.—Child, aged 3 years, died from what was registered as “ croup ” ; a week later the mother sickened and died on August 25th of “ diphtheria ”; the grandmother also who had assisted in nursing the child suffered from sore throat. Of the six fatal cases of diphtheria, three were single ones (i.e., there was no other case either of diphtheria, croup, &c., in the families invaded). Two others occurred in houses where deaths from “ croup ” also were recorded (cases 6 and 9 above), and the remaining one was associated with two mild attacks in the family invaded, and, probably, with two or three elsewhere. Unlike most of the cases of “ croup,” there was in certain of these cases of diphtheria some presumptive evidence of the spread of the disease by personal intercourse between the sufferers. * These two children were both convalescing from measles, and a week earlier a child living in an adjoining house had died of that disease. | This family, consisting of five persons, occupied an isolated farm house near Westhoughton. The boy was not known to have been exposed to risk of any infection; he sickened on January 14th, 1888, with headache, dizziness, sore throat, and quickly succeeding prostration. He died on the 18th, the throat symptoms becoming the most prominent, so that the death was certified as from “ laryngitis.” Within about a w;eek three other young people at the house developed somewhat similar, although less severe, symptoms. Dizziness appears to have been chiefly complained of and slight sore throat; a mottled appearance of the skin, somewhat resembling urticaria, except that there was no elevation of the whitish patches, is likewise spoken of. No subsequent desquamation of the cuticle occurred, nor could 1 ascertain that there had been any symptom of paralysis. Twelve cows were kept on the farm at the time, the milk being chiefly used, except for a small quantity consumed by the family, in butter making ; and the farmer states that shortly before and at the time of his children’s illness three of the cows suffered from some feverish attack with “ bad colds.” No sores on the teats were observed. J This family lived at Horwich; the second child had been sent from home on the sister’s seizure, and had only returned three days when she herself sickened. Clearly developed membrane and albuminuria are spoken of as distinguishing the first attack. § The two children (residing at Horwich likewise) had been accustomed to play near an open sewage gutter. A 2