Reply to Sir John Hall's 'Observations' on the report of the Sanitary Commission, despatched to the seat of war in the East, 1855-56 / by John Sutherland.

  • Sutherland, John, 1808-1891.
Date:
1857
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Reply to Sir John Hall's 'Observations' on the report of the Sanitary Commission, despatched to the seat of war in the East, 1855-56 / by John Sutherland. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    from 4,440 in January, to 4,178 in February. The mortality in the Hospitals nevertheless rose from 316 per 1000 in January, to 427 per 1000 in February, while at Kululi it was no less than 520 per lOOO on the cases treated. Even if we exclude the excessive mortality in February, we find— 4. That the mortahty on board transports for 4 months, from October 1854, to January 1855, was 7'2 per 1000, and the deaths in Hospital 176 per 1000, while in March the mortality on board trans- ports fell to 4^ per 1000 ; but the deaths in Hospital nevertheless rose to 315 per 1000 in the 3 weeks ending March 17th, when our sanitary improvements were commenced. Besides these obvious conclusions from the table, which also shews that the mortality in the Hospitals went on increasing the longer they were used, and the rapid decline in mortality while the sanitary im- provements were in progress, we have the experience already alluded to, of the far larger proportion of recoveries among sick of the same class, and at the same time, where the sick were not exposed to the polluted atmosphere of the Scutari Hospitals. No privations to which the sick of an army could have been exposed, could have been more severe than those which befel the sick in the Crimea during the winter months of 1854—55. With- out proper shelter, covering, supplies, or equip- ments, for a considerable part of the time, they ought to have perished in large proportion to the recoveries, and yet the mortality in the Crimea was much less than at Scutari.* Sir Alexander Tulloch has shewn that the sick * As nearly as we can ascertain, from the data at our disposal, the approximate number of sick treated in the Crimea, between October 1st, 1.854, and April 30th, 1855, amounted to 38,786, and the deaths to 5,531, or 142 per 1000, while the mortality among the sick treated at Scutari, where they ought to have had every advantage, was 227 per 1000 during the same period.