THE PRINCIPAL CAUSES OF MORTALITY IN 



QUEENSLAND. 



By SIDNEY G. MARTIN, A.I.A. (Lond.). 



(Read before the Royal, Hocietji of Qiwensland, ISth April, 1901), 



When making this investigation into the various causes of 

 mortality in Queensland, I at first intended to take the whole 

 40 years since separation. I found, however, that the figures 

 in the earlier years were too small, and the causes of death in 

 some cases too vague to lend themselves to useful and reliable 

 results, consequently I have restricted the investigation to the 

 twenty-five years 1875/99, dividing this term into five periods of 

 five years each. 



The value of comparative mortality statistics is often much 

 impaired by reason of the diverse conditions that effect various 

 populations. Death rates, arrived at simply on the basis of total 

 deaths to total population, can be safely compared only when 

 the number alive at the various ages are- in the same ratio, 

 when the sexes are in the same proportion, and when there is 

 no considerable alien population subject to a different rate of 

 mortality to disturb the result. When these conditions exist 

 and are not allowed for, results which are more or less 

 misleading are brought out. 



In Queensland more than in most countries has allowance 

 to be made for peculiar conditions. The increase of the male 

 population in this State owes more to immigration in comparison 

 with the natural increase than any other Australian State, 

 except Western Australia. The result of this is that the 

 number of males in the prime of life is greater than it 

 otherwise would be and far exceeds the number of females ; 

 thus at the last census in 1891 while the male population under 

 20 differed very little from the female in that group, 

 the males over 20 numbered 131,000, as compared with 

 80,000 females. 



