Distribution of small-pox in the metropolis during successive periods of the decennium 1870-85 : with a report on small-pox in West Ham during 1884-85.
- Date:
- 1888
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Distribution of small-pox in the metropolis during successive periods of the decennium 1870-85 : with a report on small-pox in West Ham during 1884-85. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service. The original may be consulted at London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service.
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![No. 2. Report on the Behaviour of Small-pox in the Borough (Urban raap-z. Sanitary District) of West Ham (luring the Epidemic of ] 884-85 ; ° Small-pox in - _ J ' or ' Wfist Hum I have inspected the hospital at Plaistow, which in 1884 was hired by the Metropolitan Asylums Board from the Poplar District Board of Works for use as a small-pox hospital for London patients. And I have inquired respecting the behaviour of small-pox in the West Ham Urban District during the epidemic of 1884-85, with especial reference to the concern that this and other two Plaistow small-pox hospitals may have had in the small-pox incidences witnessed. For a general description of the Poplar hospital I refer to a letter* dated 20th January 1881, from the clerk to the Poplar District Board of Works addressed to the Asylums Board, a copy of which letter is appended to this report. Attached to the letter is a block plan* of the site, and I annex a map* of West Ham (6 inches to the mile) showing the relation of this and two other Plaistow small-pox hospitals to the Urban Sanitary District. It will be seen that the Poplar hospital, the West Ham Guardians' hospital, and the Cottage small-pox hospital of the West Ham Urban Sanitary Authority, are situated near together on the extreme eastern border of West Ham parish (the Urban Sanitary District) about 100 yards or so N. and N.W. of the Barking high road. The Poplar hospital is bounded on three sides by roads, two of which have become built upon on their sides furthest from the hospital. South of the hospital, and within 30 feet of it, is a cottage in a triangular garden which is on one of its sides coterminous with the hospital boundary. The site of the hospital is only about three-quarters of an acre, and barely suffices for the hospital buildings crowded upon it. Thus the external wall of the northern pavilion is only 20 feet from Southern Road, while the western extremities of both pavilions are not 10 feet from Short Street, North. East of the hospital certain receiving rooms are less than 20 feet from Western Road; on the south the external wall of the administrative block is on the extreme boundary of the hospital site. The Poplar hospital, though consisting of two separate pavilions each of two storeys, has only single administrative offices, and so far has never been made to accommodate at one and the same time patients suffering from different infectious diseases. Indeed it has since its erection in 1879 only been utilised on three separate occasions. As the Poplar District hospital, it received between May 1881 and May 1882, 165 small-pox cases; and between October 1882 and May 1883, 22 cases of scarlet fever. As a metropolitan small-pox hospital under the Asylums Board it had (according to Metropolitan Asylums Board returns) under treatment between 31st May 1884 and May 1885, 645 small-pox cases. The small-pox epidemic of 1884-85 has fallen on the West Ham Urban Sanitary District with very peculiar severity. In a population estimated in 1885 at 160,000, it caused in the two years 650 deaths, a rate annually of 2 in every 1,000 of the inhabitants. Small- pox in West Ham, as in the metropolis, began to be abundant about March 1884, and during April, May, and early June attained epidemic prevalence. Then for a while, as indeed is usual in London during the summer season, the disease abated somewhat in this district; but by Mr. W. H. Power. West Ham (luring 1884-85: by Mr. Power. * Not reproduced here,](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b24399279_0091.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
