[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for Fulham].

  • Fulham (London, England). Board of Works.
Date:
1860
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)

Credit: [Report of the Medical Officer of Health for Fulham]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: City of London, London Metropolitan Archives

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    10 ducers, because the feeding of these animals thus near to the supply has offered a profitable employment to those engaged in its gratuitous collection, and because until the constitution of your Board as a sanitary supervisor no impediment of consequence was offered to the corruption of the air by the boiling of offensive offal and the pollution of our open ditches by the drainage of extensive piggeries. During the past year several prohibitory Magisterial orders have been obtained against persons keeping Pigs in improper places. removal of domestic refuse. The speedy and regular removal of domestic refuse is an equally important sanitary requirement, and yet there is perhaps none where greater difficulty has been experienced in effecting it in this District. However well the Contractor may be disposed to carry-out the stipulation he has agreed to, he is greatly at the mercy of the men employed by him. It generally happens, too, that the persons who enter into these engagements with the Local Authorities are engaged in other branches of trade requiring the plant necessary for carrying into effect a contract of this kind, and hence it is much to be feared that the collection of the refuse is made subservient to the other more profitable employment of it. The men engaged are fully aware of their irresponsibilty to the Vestries and District Boards, and that their officers have no direct authority over them, and hence the numerous complaints which continually inundate the Office with reference to this subject. The time will come when the authorities must take this matter into their own hands, and although it might probably form an item of direct expenditure it will not be without its indirect advantages. sickness returns. By the kind consideration of the Board of Guardians and the Committee of the West London Hospital I have been enabled through the past year to ascertain every week the exact amount of pauper sickness prevailing in the District, and thereby to take prompt measures for checking as far as possible the progress of any special malady. This facility has been of vital importance particu larly with regard to cases of Small Pox which have occurred at intervals. It gives me an opportunity also of observing what class of disease may be incidental to particular localities: thus, of 97 cases of Diarrhoea recorded in Fulham under the Union Medical Officers, 41 occurred in the immediate neighbourhood of North End, 21 in that of Walham Green, and 22 in Fulham Fields. Of 40 cases of Diarrhoea in Hammersmith 21 occurred in or near the Rookery and Slater's Buildings, as also did 4 of English Cholera. Of 10 cases of Fever recorded in Fulham 5 occurred in Crown-street and Parson's Green; and of 19 cases in Hammersmith G occurred in the Rookery, &c., and 10 in the neighbourhood of South-street
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