[Report 1892] / Medical Officer of Health, Leeds Borough.

  • Leeds (England). City Council.
Date:
1892
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: [Report 1892] / Medical Officer of Health, Leeds Borough. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    36/170 (page 30)
    Small-pox. Small-pox was present during 1892, though not to such an extent as to appreciably affect our death returns. On the 12th of September I reported to you upon the slight prevalence of the disease in the early part of the year. By that time the outbreak seemed to be almost at an end. After shewing where the cases had occurred up to the middle of August, I concluded my report as follows :— Solitary cases occurred in different streets, two on the 18th and %y J one on the 19th. It was thought desirable, on the outbreak of the August cases, to have a house-to-house visitation made of every district in which small-pox had occurred, for it seemed likely that the infection of some of these cases might have been due to others which had been concealed from us. Accordingly, between the 15th and 19th, inclusive, the inspectors visited 2,024 houses round the seven houses in which cases occurred, and the last case named, the one removed on the 19th of August, was the only case of small¬ pox found. It was at once isolated, and the rest of the family disinfected. After the lapse of a fortnight the same houses to the number 2,023 were revisited, but no case of small-pox was found in any of them. I think there is no reason to suppose that there is any small-pox in Leeds, except the convalescent cases now in our hospital. Considering that 'this disease has been in our near- neighbourhood now for a couple of years, we have been on the whole fortunate in escaping a serious outbreak. From the 19th of August to the 22nd of September, except a single patient who developed the disease in our own sanatorium (shelter), and who was, of course, under observation for that purpose and immediately isolated, we heard of no case of small-pox. On that day a young man in Burley, not previously vaccinated, manifested the disease. About a week later another case occurred in Eoundhay Eoad, and another in Wellington Lane the same week. Two cases occurred in other parts of the town the following week (the first of the winter quarter), and three in the Leeds Workhouse. The next week (the second of the fourth quarter) two cases occurred, both in lodging houses^ one of these patients