[Report 1935] / Medical Officer of Health, Huddersfield County Borough.

  • Huddersfield (England). County Borough Council.
Date:
1935
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: [Report 1935] / Medical Officer of Health, Huddersfield County Borough. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    6/126 (page 6)
    Public Health Department, Huddersfield, June, 1936. To the Chairman and Members of the Health Committee. Gentlemen, I have the honour to present to you the Annual Report for the year 1935 on the Public Health Services of the Borough, in accordance with Article 14 (3) of the Sanitary Officers’ Order, 1926. The Report follows the lines indicated by the Ministry of Health in Circular 1492, dated October 18th, 1935. Although it is an ordinary Report, and not a survey one of the five yearly series, a number of Tables giving rates and statistics for earlier years are included, as the continuity of information of this kind adds greatly to its value. The year which has passed was not a particularly good one from the point of view of health, for although the summer provided sun¬ shine in excess of the average, this was followed by one of the most severe winters of recent years, and deaths from such conditions as Pneumonia and Bronchitis were more in number than in the previous year. The good old fashioned type of winter may bestow its pleasures and thrills upon those endowed with the vigour of youth, but it brings its added risks to those at the extremes of life—the very young and the aged, who are less able to withstand its rigours. One of the agreeable features of the year was a much welcomed fall in the prevalence of infectious diseases. So far as the records available show, last vear was the first in which neither Measles nor Whooping Cough appeared as a cause of death on the Registrar’s Returns, and there wras a marked fall in the incidence of both Diphtheria and Scarlet Fever. In spite of this fall it will be noted that 30 deaths from Diphtheria occurred. One calls attention to these because here we have a group of deaths most, if not all, of which might with a little foresight and co-operation have been avoided, for our experience year after year confirms the claim made for immunisa¬ tion that it offers approximately a ninety per cent, protection against infection and practically a hundred per cent, protection against death from the disease. It is a simple, inexpensive, quite harmless and most reliable safeguard. Can it be that its simplicity is in itself a hindrance to more universal acceptance ? Many people seem to clamour for something spectacular and value everything according to its cost ; the insignificant looking injection which is quickly given and as quickly forgotten is to them much less impressive than the steam tent and the tracheotomy tube, yet the former is the counsel of wisdom, and the latter the treatment of despair. Another gratifying feature of the year’s statistics was the low infantile mortality rate. The rate for last year was the lowest ever recorded for the district, and, so far as is known, was lowrer than that of any other County Borough in the North. Last year’s figure was exceptionally small, but at the same time the rate has been consistently low for several years ; this must surely be regarded as a tribute to the unique scheme for infant welfare wdiich is operating in Huddersfield.