Death certification and registration in Scotland : its present defects and a proposed remedy / by John Glaister.

  • Glaister, John, 1856-1932.
Date:
1893
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Death certification and registration in Scotland : its present defects and a proposed remedy / by John Glaister. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    DEATH CERTIFICATION AND REGISTRATION IN SCOTLAND.* 0- In the Report of the Royal Sanitary Commission of 1869, which was presented to Parliament in the session of ] 870-71, the following important statement may be found:— It is important that there should be no ' uncertified' deaths—that is, no cases in which deaths and their supposed causes are reported to the registrars by any other than the medical attendant of the deceased person, or some qualified medical man. In every such case there is not only a fact lost for the statistics on which a part of the study of public health is based, but a great opportunity permitted for fraud and crime. With that statement every one interested in public health wijl doubtless agree, as will also those, probably, whose duty it is to enquire more closely into the subject which forms the closing paragraph of the foregoing statement. Since the passing of the Registration Act of 1854, and more particularly in these recent years, it has become noteworthy that efficiency in the registration of the cause of every death has not been attained; and from time to time the attention of the public and of the State has been drawn to the facts In the year 1871 the late Dr. Fergus, of Glasgow, dealt with the subject. In 1875 the able medical oflScer of health tor Glasgow, and the President of one of the Sections of this Congress, Dr. Russell, in an elaborate monograph directed the attention of his local authority to the great prevalence of uncertified deaths in Glasgow. In 1883, the Lancet (vol. i, p. 1106) made a very serious charge against the Registrar-General for Scotland, and against AugSM893^°'' ^^''^ ^'^^^^ Edinburgh,