Report on the sanitary condition of the Parish of St. John, Hampstead for the year 1896.

  • Hampstead (London, England). Parish. Vestry.
Date:
1897
Catalogue details

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

Credit: Report on the sanitary condition of the Parish of St. John, Hampstead for the year 1896. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    12/18 page 12
    12 Disinfection.—The number of houses disinfected after infectious disease was 187. The total number of articles disinfected reached 9,561, a slight iucrease on the number for the previous year. Complaints of sewer emanations were less numerous than hitherto, and have all received the careful attention of the Public Health Committee and staff. Points frequently complained of were those in the vicinity of the sewer ventilators situated in Nassington and Parliament Hill Roads A Sub-Committee visited the Strand District to observe the effect of a Deakins' Sewer Gas Extractor and Destructor placed at the dead end of a sewer. It was stated that complaints of offensive emanations had ceased since the destructor had been started, and that the house holders closely adjoining the lamp had not experienced any incon venience from the proximity of the lamp to the windows. Your Committee resolved to defer the consideration of the subject for three months, for the purpose of obtaining further information thereon. Water Supply.—Hampstead is supplied by water for domestic purposes by the New River and West Middlesex Companies. The water of the New River Company has throughout the year contained less organic matter than that of the West Middlesex, the average proportion in a given quantity being—New River 1.7, West Middlesex 3.2. Professor Frank land states that the Thames was, owing to floods in March, October, and December, somewhat less pure than that delivered for 1895; but that the New River water was not affected by that cause. The average daily consumption is estimated to be 28 gallons per person for all purposes. With respect to the presence of organic matter in water, either of vegetable or animal origin, Professor Frank land states that it is gratifying to find that the zymotic matters of the pathogenic kind are rapidly destroyed in running water, and that it is now an established fact that efficient sand filtration would prevent the passage of such germs into the filtered water, even should they arrive in a living condition at the intakes of the companies. This result of recent observations is confirmed by the absence in London since the year 1866 of zymotic disease traceable to the water supply.
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