SOCIAL STATISTICS. 



British army at home and abroad, 50-42 were 

 constantly non-effective from sickness ; and in 

 the British navy, 1870, 46-3 in 1000 were con- 

 stantly sick. 



Epidemic Diseases attack many people at once, 

 or in succession, and also travel from place to 

 place, often in the most frequented routes. They 

 are most deadly where the people are most 

 massed together and filthiest, and most negligent 

 of sanitation. In London, 1258, an epidemic 

 killed 15,000 persons, and the Black Death (1348) 

 killed half the people. In London, the plague, a 

 malignant typhus fever, killed in 1625, 35,417 

 people (other diseases, 18,848), in 1665, 82,000 

 (other diseases, 28,710). In 1613, the plague 

 killed 200,000 persons in Constantinople. 



Cholera was the next great epidemic in England 

 and Wales, and killed 30,924 persons in 1831-32, 

 53,293 in 1849, 20,097 in 1854, and 14,378 in 1866. 

 In the United Kingdom, 1848-49, and 1853-54, 

 it attacked nearly 5,000,000 persons, and killed 

 250,000. The death-rate from cholera, in this 

 country, 1831-32, was i in 452 of the population ; 

 in 1848-49, I in 333 ; in 1853-54, i in 999; the 

 death-rate from diarrhoea being in these years 

 i in 999. The cholera death-rate in town dis- 

 tricts, 1848-49, was i in 153 of the population ; 

 1 853-54, J m 4?6 ; and in other districts, I in 

 1666, and i in 2500. There were 3 deaths in 

 coast to i in inland districts in 1848-49, and 5 to 

 I in 1853-54. In London, the death-rate was I 

 in 161 in 1848-49; and i in 232 in 1853-54; and 

 varying from I in 1000 in the highest parts of the 

 city to i in 66 in the lowest. In London (1831-32), 

 the cholera attacked 11,020 persons, and killed 

 5275. The district death-rate of cholera epi- 

 demics has varied from 3 to above 70 in 10,000 

 of the inhabitants. In one epidemic, cholera has 

 attacked as many as i in 20 inhabitants in 

 Russia. In the British army, the cholera death- 

 rate has been generally i in 3, or 3-5 of those 

 attacked. 



Small-pox used to decimate nations, and dis- 

 figure, and often render blind those that survived 

 its attacks ; but vaccination, discovered in 1798, 

 and now enforced by law in most civilised 

 countries, has vastly diminished its frequency and 

 virulence. Before its introduction, hardly 4 in loo 

 persons of the age of 30 escaped small-pox ; 65 in 

 loo infants and children under the age of 5 had it, 

 and of the infants attacked, i in 3 died ; of all ages, 

 i in 7 or 8 attacked, died. Before the introduc- 

 tion of vaccination into Scotland, 1799, J2O to 140 

 in looo annual deaths were from small-pox, nearly 

 20 in looo survivors of its attacks became blind, 

 and many had their faces disfigured for life. Since 

 1799, the average annual death-rate from small- 

 pox has been only 15 in 1000 of the total deaths, 

 and even that number has been chiefly of unvac- 

 cinated persons. England had a mean of 83 

 deaths from small-pox in every 1000 deaths, 

 1701-1809 ; 28 in 1810-47 J 12 m 1848-54 ; and 

 44 in 1870 during an epidemic. 



In London, an influenza epidemic, in the end of 

 1847, attacked 500,000 persons in six weeks, and 

 raised the death-rate 80 per cent, above the aver- 

 age. Of this excess of deaths, which was above 

 the mortality from cholera, during the 21 weeks 

 of its prevalence, 1831-32, only a fourth were from 

 influenza, the rest being from a great increase in 

 other lung diseases. 



Countries are often subject to minor epidemics 

 of cholera, small-pox, influenza, fever, dysentery, 

 scarlatina, measles, &c. which have in London 

 carried off 8000 or 10,000 persons at an outbreak. 

 An epidemic rarely attacks the whole people of 

 a country at once, and has never alone increased 

 the death-rate 30 per cent, above the average. 

 Epidemics generally occur at irregular intervals. 

 In fever, 10 persons, and in small-pox, 5, are often 

 disabled for a time, to i death. 



Mr Christie, of the Scottish Equitable Life- 

 assurance Company, in the following table, shews 

 the comparative fatality of diseases from the 

 causes of deaths registered in England and Wales, 

 1848-54, and the ratio of deaths from each group 

 of diseases to 100,000 deaths. 



Some diseases are more fatal in towns than in 

 rural districts. To 100 deaths, in English rural 

 districts, by the following diseases, there die in 

 towns by asthma, 380; erysipelas, 371; convul- 

 sions and teething, 257 ; cephalitis and hydro- 

 cephalus, 241 ; pneumonia, bronchitis, and pleurisy, 

 199; delirium tremens, 198; typhus, 188; small- 

 pox, 173 ; heart-disease, 173 ; childbirth, 163 ; 

 syphilis, 159; gout, 155; hernia, 148; purpura, 

 146 ; sudden deaths, 145 ; liver disease, 145 ; 

 hepatitis, 135; tetanus, 132; consumption, 124; 

 croup, 123; violence, 117; stone, in ; mortifica- 

 tion, i to ; malformation, 107 ; apoplexy, 107 ; 

 haemorrhage, 102. But to 100 deaths in rural dis- 

 tricts, there die in towns of paralysis, dropsy, 

 jaundice, 99 each ; diabetes, 97 ; cancer, 92 ; 

 hydrothorax, 88 ; hasmatemesis, 79 ; debility, 75 ; 

 atrophy, 75 ; scrofula, 46. Of lung diseases, 53 

 males die in London to 39 in the country ; and of 

 typhus, 5 to i. 



The diseases and injuries most fatal to children 

 are acute lung diseases, as bronchitis ; measles, 

 scarlatina, and hooping-cough, almost peculiar to 

 children ; small-pox, if no vaccination ; croup ; 

 diarrhoea ; convulsions ; hydrocephalus ; fever ; 

 tabes mesenterica ; enteritis ; dropsy ; scrofula ; 

 burns and scalds. To adults : consumption ; brain 

 disease ; typhus ; cancer ; epilepsy ; liver disease ; 

 diabetes ; joint disease ; childbirth ; uterine disease ; 

 poison ; fractures ; contusions ; wounds. To the 

 aged : apoplexy ; paralysis ; bronchitis ; pneumonia; 

 asthma ; kidney and heart diseases ; dropsy ; 

 stone ; rheumatism. 



537 



