[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for London County Council 1951].

  • London County Council (London, England). County of London.
Date:
1952
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)

Credit: [Report of the Medical Officer of Health for London County Council 1951]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    13/170 (page 9)
    9 Nephritis large proportion of the apparent reduction in the interval was due to the increase in the civil population upon demobilisation, a purely statistical effect. For nephritis the death-rate in 1951 amounted to 0.12 per 1,000, compared with 0.11 in 1950 and an average of 0.36 over the years 1931-40. Degenerative diseases If, as an indication of mortality from degenerative diseases, heart disease, other circulatory diseases, cerebral vascular lesions, nephritis and bronchitis are combined, the following trend becomes apparent:— Mortality (per 1,000) from cardiovascular—renal disease and bronchitis 1931-40 (average) 5.33 1946 6.11 1941 7.93 1947 6.27 1942 6.93 1948 5.47 1943 7.23 1949 6.11 1944 7.12 1950 5.99 1945 6.67 1951 6.82 The true effects of the war cannot be separated from the statistical influences described on page 8 (particularly the change in 1940). The rates in recent years appear to be running higher than pre-war. Degenerative diseases thus continue to attain greater importance, and are responsible for over half the death-rate. Cancer The cancer death-rate for all ages in 1951 was 2.27 per 1,000, slightly higher than in 1950. The death-rate from cancer, which is largely a disease of the latter half of life, can be substantially changed by variations in the age constitution of the population. Some form of standardisation of the crude rate is therefore essential for true com parative purposes. Thus in England and Wales the crude cancer mortality rates between 1938 and 1945 rose 37 per cent. for males and 7 per cent. for females, but the standardised mortality rates (C.M.I.*) were almost stationary, a small rise for males and a small fall for females. The difference between the crude and standard rates for London, which lost a large proportion of the population (more young than old) by evacuation during the war, would doubtless be larger, but in London age group population estimates were not available between 1939 and 1946. Age specific rates since 1947 are shown below:— Administrative County of London Cancer Mortality Rates per 1,000 living (total population) Age and Sex 1947 1948 1949 1950 1951 Males 0-14 0.02 0.03 0.06 0.11 0.10 15-14 0.35 0.30 0.29 0.38 0.35 45 + 5.34 5.61 5.81 6.18 7.45 All Males 2.13 2.21 2.27 2.45 2.60 Females 0-14 0.04 0.03 0.05 0.07 0.09 15-44 0.34 0.36 0.33 0.37 0.35 45 + 4.27 4.44 4.42 4.51 4.83 All Females 1.88 1.95 1.93 1.98 1.99 All Persons 2.00 2.08 2.09 2.20 2.27 Up to 1949, for England and Wales, the comparative mortality index for females had fallen to 0.937 (1938 = 1.000), while the male index had risen to 1.063. In London, for both sexes combined, the long-term trend of cancer mortality can be seen from Table 3 (page 142). The increase there shown between 1891 and 1940 is due partly to the increasing age of the population and partly to improved diagnosis, but some part is doubtless attributable to increased incidence, particularly cancer of the lung. The important changes in mortality in London between 1931-33 * Comparative Mortality Index.