[Report 1928] / Medical Officer of Health, Wolverhampton County Borough.

  • Wolverhampton (England). County Borough Council.
Date:
1928
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: [Report 1928] / Medical Officer of Health, Wolverhampton County Borough. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    12/82 page 8
    The Birth Rate was 19-7 per 1,000 population, as compared with 18-2 in 1927, In 1928 the Birth Rate for the whole of England and W ales was 16*7 and for the 107 Great Towns was 16*91. (V) Deaths,—There were 1,439 (net) deaths in Wolverhampton during the year of which only three were uncertified. Although the yearly Death Rate of a town will show fluctuations as a result of abnormal climatic conditions or of the occurrence of epidemics of Influenza, Whooping Cough and other infectious diseases, the general Death Rate is steadily decreasing. This result is due in the main to two causes (a) the improved environment of the people which has been brought about as a result of the attention paid by Health Authorities to drainage, sewerage, refuse disposal, water supplies, housing, disinfection, the isolation of cases of infectious diseases and the sanitary supervision of food supplies, and (^>) by the spread of knowledge among the people of the causes of diseases and the laws of health. Unless mankind is to become immortal, death must come to everyone sooner or later but it is the aim of the Sanitarian to postpone the age of death as long as possible. Still there must be some figure below which it will be impossible to reduce the Death Rate and this figure cannot be an arbitrary and fixed one but will depend on the mean age of the population under review. A low Birth Rate for a number of consecutive years will eventu¬ ally lead to a population largely composed of persons of middle age, among whom a high Death Rate must be the natural order of things. In dealing with a Table of causes of, and ages at death, it is necessary to examine critically (1) the number of deaths that have occurred from diseases classified as preventable such as Tuberculosis, Measles, Diphtheria and (2) the number of lives that have been cut short before thev reached the mean age of death. It must not be forgotten that the deaths of the aged are frequently ascribed to the organ or tissues of the body whose functional efficiency first gives out (whether it be the lungs, kidneys, heart or arteries ) and are not so commonly certified as due to Senile Decay. The Heart Disease or Bronchitis of persons around 70 years of age arc more often than not terminal affections in a body the tissues of
    digitised image 1
    digitised image 2
    digitised image 3