Mr. Spear's report to the Local Government Board upon the prevalence of diphtheria in the Fareham registration district, and upon the occurrence therein of enteric fever.

  • Spear, John.
Date:
1889
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Mr. Spear's report to the Local Government Board upon the prevalence of diphtheria in the Fareham registration district, and upon the occurrence therein of enteric fever. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Sanitary condition of the schools. Sanitary condition of villages. 6 by convalescents and by clothing from infected houses ; on the other hand, there is the fact that in the majority of the cases amongst school children the attacks were isolated, that is to say, were single in their respective families. If personal infection were the sufficient factor in these repeated outbreaks at the mixed school, it would seem to have gained a potency there not possessed either outside or in the infant school. [Careful inquiry was made for obscure attacks of sickness that might have been Diphtheritic, and, so far as possible, the facts collected concerning all reported cases of sore-throat in the neighbourhood. In a few cases reports of the existence of sickness of this sort were found to be without foundation ; in others, the ailments had been of an altogether trivial kind, with hardly anything either in the clinical or etiological history to suggest diphtheria. I do not think it possible that undiscovered cases of diphtheria could have existed in this locality, and during this period, in any number, or could materially modify the observations recorded above.] The two schools stand on sandy soil at one corner of Sarisbury Green, a narrow plantation and the high road separating them. The mixed school consists of one long room divided by a partition; the whole giving floor space equal to some 1,350 square feet, or a trifle more than 10 square feet per head supposing the total number of children on the books were present, and a cubical capacity of some 14,400 feet. The building stands on a slope, so that a considerable space is left beneath the floor. In one part this is vacant although enclosed, and the inspector of nuisances, who had examined it, reported it was practically unventilated ; dry, but permeated by an exceedingly “ musty ” smell. The remainder is utilised as the kitchen and scullery of the schoolmaster’s house, and until the autumn of 1887, when a new house adjoining was built for him, his sitting-room was situated here also.* An internal staircase provides direct communication between this basement and the school room. In April 1887, when the premises were examined by the medical officer of health and inspector of nuisances, it was found that much stagnant water lay beneath the kitchen and scullery floor, and that a defective and leaky drain was likewise contaminating that space. Within some 10 feet of this drain, moreover, the well was situated, and the water (to which it is believed the children had occasional access), was found to be polluted by soakage from the drain. These drainage defects were remedied about September 1887, and a new house, as I have said, was built for the school¬ master. A little earlier in the year ventilators, of the “ Tobin tube ” variety, were inserted in the school room (before inadequately ventilated), and the school-room was lime-washed. The school privies, situated some yards from the building, are reported to have been, until June 1887 (the third time of closing the school on account of diphtheria), exceedingly foul; and now their defects have only been partially remedied by curtailing the size of the cesspits, and by the provision of a small pipe shaft as a ventilator. The infant school is built on level ground and has no basement, dwelling, or drain in connexion with it. Ill-kept earth or ash closets stand, however, in very close proximity to the school-room door. Referring to the sanitary circumstances of the locality generally, the houses are for the most part built in very small groups or wholly detached. Some few are dilapidated and ill-ventilated and dirty, but this is not the general condition. The ground water rises very near to the surface in times of rain, and dampness of dwellings is a very common feature. Means of drainage and of excrement disposal are often such that nuisance results. Privy pits are in general use, and slops and other liquid sewage are cast into open pits often not far from the dwelling. The wells are much subject to surface contamina¬ tion, and those of several of the infected houses were found on examination to contain a considerable quantity of mud and surface washings. There are a few rows of dwellings that require special notice on account of their unwholesomeness. One of these, “ Long Shore,” has already been referred to. Swanscombe Terrace and Nightingale Terrace, have, unlike Long Shore, been built quite recently. The drains, from original faults of construction, are in a chronic state of dis-repair and are usually stopped; the closets and cesspools are overflowing, and the surface around the dwellings rapidly becoming thoroughly sewage sodden. The water, from wells sunk amongst this filth, is complained of as obviously befouled. Neither of these rows, consisting of about 30 dwellings, chanced to be infected with diphtheria. * The schoolmaster’s family consisted at that time of two adults and two elder children. They do not appear to have suffered from any symptoms of diphtheria.