Annual medical report / East Africa Protectorate.

  • East Africa Protectorate. Medical Department
Date:
[1915]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Annual medical report / East Africa Protectorate. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Eaces who contracted Plague. Race. Cases. Deaths. Asiatics 5 3 Natives ... 29 27 Total ... ... 34 30 Kisumu and district as endemic plague centres constitute a standing menace to the whole Protectorate, as in 15 areas of the town the disease has claimed victims, and this has been the case for the last eight years in succession. The importance of the town to the whole country needs no insistence ; it is a terminus of the Eailway, the port of the Uganda Marine, and to it thousands of tons of grain and other country produce are annually brought. This, added to the fact that plague has been reported in the outlying corn producing districts of Maragoli, Bunyore, Sagam and Seme, emphasizes the necessity for the adoption of speedy and thorough measures for the sanitation of the town and district, the erection of rat-proof grain stores and houses, with the installation of a fumigation plant capable of dealing with these materials in bulk. The measures adopted in townships to anticipate any serious outbreak have consisted of periodical visitations by the staff, voluntary or compulsory inoculation with Half kin’s prophylactic, and a rat destruction campaign. The work accomplished is shown in the following tables :— Inoculation by Haffkin’s Prophylactic. Locality. 1913. 1914. 1915. Mombasa 48,478 9,447 Nil 1 Voluntary Nairobi ... 576 6,839 113) inoculation only. Kisumu ... ... ... 12,920 14,716 6,765 Eat Destruction. Locality. 1913 1914. 1915. Number caught. Number infected. Number. caught. Number infected. Number caught. Number infected. Mombassa 1,656 Generally. 10,044 17 19,094 Nil Nairobi ... 2,882 8 6,839 17 10,932 1 Kisumu ... 10,183 12 11,084 19 5,309 7 Total . 14,721 27,967 35,335 SMALL POX. This disease was not recognised in any district in the country until the end of the year, when it became evident that a number of cases were recurring in the Mumias Township, North Kavirondo, and towards the Uganda border, where the disease was reported as being prevalent. All cases coming under observation at Mombasa were ship-borne, or introduced from outside; no case occurred in the town. Those in Mumias and the Uganda border appeared in October, the disease successively invading Kisumu, October-November; Nairobi, November-December. (At the time of writing, June, 1916, an extensive epidemic has invaded the whole of the Nyanza Province, and is extending to the Kenia and Ukamba Provinces.) [260763] 5
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