[Report 1938] / Medical Officer of Health, Essex County Council.

  • Essex (England). County Council.
Date:
1938
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: [Report 1938] / Medical Officer of Health, Essex County Council. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    6/128 (page 4)
    PREFACE. To the Chairman and Members of the County Council. I have the honour to submit to you my Twentieth Annual Report for the Administrative County of Essex for the year 1938. This is the 49th Annual Report which has been issued. The routine features of the Report have been curtailed, primarily owing to pressure of other work, particularly air raid precautions, but also to provide an opportunity for including an abridged account of the epidemic of Acute Anterior Poliomyelitis. At mid-year 1938, the population, as estimated by the Registrar-General, was 1,395,100, being an increase of 17,400, which is considerably less than the figure (33,240) in 1937. More babies were born in the Administrative County during the year 1938 than in the year 1937, the number of births being 20,570 and 19,991 respectively. This resulted in the slightly increased birth-rate (14.7) in 1938, the rate for 1937 being 14.5, and the comparative rates for England and Wales being 15.1 and 14.9 respectively. The lowest rate (9.9) in the Administrative County was again in the Clacton-on-Sea Urban District, and the highest (19.7) was again in the Hornchurch Urban District where the development of new housing estates has been phenomenal for several years. Fewer people died in Essex during the year, the number of deaths decreasing from 13,956 in 1937 to 13,467 in 1938, and the death rate from 10.1 to 9.6 respectively. Comparative rates for England and Wales also showed a decrease from 12.4 to 11.6. Causes of death are recorded in the Table on page 102, from which it will be seen that the highest figure was Heart Disease (3,455) which was 33 less than the previous year, but the next highest figure, Cancer (2,154) was 98 more than in 1937. The number of deaths of infants under one year of age decreased from 910 in 1937 to 869 in 1938, the infant mortality rate falling from 46 in 1937 to 42 in 1938. Essex rates in this respect always compare very favourably with those for England and Wales, the comparative rates being 58 and 53 respectively. The Administrative County was again entirely free from smallpox, and there was a reduction in the total notifications of infectious diseases. Scarlet fever and pneu- monia were less prevalent, but there was an increase in the number of cases of Acute Anterior Poliomyelitis. I am indebted to Dr. F. E. Camps, Pathologist at the Chelmsford & Essex Hospital, for his helpful services and for a detailed account of the outbreak of this disease, extracts from which are recorded on pages 31 to 35. Every Hospital Authority and Medical Officer of Health concerned responded readily to the need for co-operative action, and the pooling of all the resources available was a great help in securing control of the outbreak and in providing promptly the best diagnostic