Report on the Wey valley floods in relation to public health / by the Consulting Medical Officer.

  • Surrey (England). County Council.
Date:
1913
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Report on the Wey valley floods in relation to public health / by the Consulting Medical Officer. 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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    In discussing the influence of Floods on Health, it hardly needs much argument to demonstrate their ill-effect when the dwellings of populous areas are partly submerged, and when the necessaries of life have to be provided for by the help of boats. Such was the flood which visited Nottingham in the summer of 1876. Its height is recorded on the Trent Bridge. A large proportion of the dwellings in the meadows flat region of the borough were, except for the upper living rooms, submerged. Typhoid was not at that time specially prevalent, and the season was previous to the annual recurrence of Epidemic Diarrhoea. Had it not been for that, the zymotic death- rate in the area would have been increased. It may Ire generally assumed that floods of this kind, even in a far less degree, are injurious to health, though they do not cause epidemics of such dis- eases as Scarlet Fever and Measles. The comparatively recent example of Norwich is sometimes quoted, as if the effects of floods on health were exaggerated because some people are so ill-informed as to predict epidemic illness of all kinds as an immediate consequence. The truth is that floods of far less magnitude than those just men- tioned, the floods, for example, that annually recur at Old Woking and Send, constitute not only an acute source of discomfort for the unfortunate residents, but leave behind them the foundations of illness of many kinds, and often of a chronic nature. It hardly requires a Medical Officer of Health to pronounce an opinion on a matter in which the inhabitants of the district can so well judge for themselves. Nothing but dire necessity can attach people to such localities. It is one of the greatest wants of the present day that floods, which are gigantic “ Nuisances injurious to Public Health.” should be reduced. But the extent to which ill-health arises is not confined to such occurrences as those just noticed. There are conditions of the soil which sometimes lead to and sometimes follow floods which are liable to become continuing causes of disease. They are the saturation and wetness of the earth upon and near to the surface which have long been recognised as the underlying causes of illness, either directly or indirectly, sometimes through the medium of insect life. The classical Reports of the Medical Department of the Privy Council may be referred to on this subject. (10). Dr. Pierce in a letter to the River Wey Floods Association, refers to the remarkable lesson taught us by the experiences of the Fen Districts of Lincolnshire and Cambridgeshire. (8). There ague was formerly prevalent. When the Great Land Drainage Systems came