Annual medical and sanitary report / Uganda Protectorate.

  • Uganda Protectorate. Medical Department.
Date:
[1916]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Annual medical and sanitary report / Uganda Protectorate. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    17/48 (page 15)
    It was fortunate that this did not occur a few months earlier when, prior to the advance of the British and Belgian forces into German East Africa, these two places had been important centres on the lines of communi¬ cation. It is significant that the outbreak quickly followed the relaxation of the special precautions taken to prevent smallpox spreading to the troops. The appended table of vaccinations include those performed on military troops and porters before leaving for the front but do not include a large number of vaccinations performed by missionaries and others. It will be seen that a large number of failures are recorded among the observed results. The low percentage of successful results shown against the dry lymph obtained from the Lister Institute is chiefly due to the complete failure of one batch of lymph which may be accounted for by delay in transit. The poor results obtained from the Nairobi lymph is a more serious matter as the bulb of the lymph used is obtained from this source. Also the Medical Officers have again expressed doubts as to the immunising power of the lymph. In support of this opinion they report 29 cases of smallpox among those recently vaccinated, of these ten (six of whom died) were known to have shown good marks. Cases were also recorded of pustular eruptions following vaccination and the District Medical Officer, Mbale, reported a series of cases of a pemphigoid rash following vaccination with one batch of Nairobi lymph. TABLE OF VACCINATIONS (Military and Civil). Lymph. Successful. Modified. Failed. Unknown. Totals. Number of known results. Percentage of successful (plus modified). Lister dry ... 722 362 904 1,988 1,084 66 60 Lister lanol ... 242 95 32 538 907 369 91-32 Nairobi glycer 8,397 918 4,520 35,784 49,619 13,835 67-32 Arm to arm ... 599 168 1,405 2,172 767 78-09 Totals 9,960 1,013 5,082 38,631 54,686 16,055 68-34 Total of military vaccinations for 1916 is 24,065. Plague. Plague has this year attacked both Jinja and Kampala in epidemic form. A special report on the epidemic is appended. Since this report was written there have been no further cases at Jinja but sporadic cases of rat and human plague continue to crop up in the vicinity of Kampala. In the Eastern Province there was a decrease this year in the death returns in Teso and the lower figure for Lango however is possibly not alto¬ gether accurate, as the system of inspection had to be modified owing to two of the native inspectors being convicted of taking bribes and otherwise practising extortion on the Lango peasants; consequently it was necessary to limit the scope of their operations for administrative reasons, so that it is possible that a number of deaths were not reported. In Bukedi there has been a large increase especially in the Budama district. The District Medical Officer states “It is a matter for doubt whether this increase in Budama is wholly due to plague. I believe that many deaths were due to cerebro-spinal meningitis but cannot prove it.” As this increase was most marked at the time when large numbers of military porters were being demobilised and coincident with other outbreaks, it is very probable that his surmise is correct.