6
REPORT ON THE
STATEMENT No. III.
Deaths in Calcutta hospitals in 1885 and the seven previous years.
YEAR.
ALL DISEASES, EXCEPT CASES
TREAED IN EYE INFIRMARY.
CHOLERA.
Death
-rate,
excluding
cholera.
Number of
deaths regis
-tered by
the muni
-cipality.
Rate per
mille o
f population.
Treated.
Died.
Died per
mille.
T r e a t e d . Died. Died per
mille.
1878 ..
... ...
27,908
4,518
161
579
323
557
153
16,396
38.1
1879 ... ... ...
22.197
3.602
162
634
351
553
150
13,044
30.3
1880 ... ... ...
21,032
2.906
138
356
183
514
131
11,681
27.1
1881 ... ... ...
20,156
2,876
142
589
304
516
131
13,030
3 0 .
1882 ... ... ...
20,078
2,886
143
859
468
544
125
13,177
30.4
1883 ... ... ...
19,872
2,719
136
932
510
547
116
12,325
2 8 . 4
1884 ... ..
21,166
3,079
145
1,023
536
523
126
13,256
30.5
1885 ... ... ...
23,339
2,936
125
627
362
577
113
12,707
29.3
25. Mortality.—Of 23,339 patients treated in. the several hospitals, 2,936
died, or a rate of 125 per mille. This rate contrasts most favourably with
that of the seven preceding years. It is indeed the lowest yet reached. If
we exclude the cholera cases treated, which were attended with the full measure
of fatality, the death-rate (113 only) was by far the smallest on record.
26. The immunity which follows on the cessation of an epidemic is greatly
influenced by the severity of the outbreak. This has long since been
recognised. Let us not then take to ourselves too much credit, should the
public health, in the coming year, exhibit, by a greatly diminished mortality
among diseases classed as preventable, an apparently more satisfactory condition
of the city, that the improvement is an illustration of the benefits arising from
vigorous sanitary reforms. We are too prone to forget, when all danger
is passed, the evils which surround us. During the late outbreaks of epidemic
cholera and small-pox most people died in the worst wards of the city and its
s u b u r b s . I t i s h e r e t h a t i m p o r t a n t s t r u c t u r a l s a n i t a r y w o r k s a r e m o s t n e e d e d
to rectify matters in these situations, where the inevitable connection between
dirt and disease was sufficiently illustrated.
STATEMENT NO. IV.
Deaths of men, women, and children in 1885.
MEN.
WO MEN.
CHILDREN.
Treated.
Died.
Treated .
Died.
Treated.
Died.
Male. Female. Male. Female.
Medical College Hospital* ... ... ... ...
3,017
330
2 , 2 1 7
151
3 0 4
3 5 9
34
46
General Hospital ...
...
...
...
...
...
2.766
74
433
18
106
112
6
8
Mayo Hospital... ... ...
2,093
223
338
44
93
40
11
5
Campbell Hospital ... ... ... 5,769
1,118
1,573
455
141
128
23
18
Police Hospital
...
...
...
...
...
...
2,329
2
. . . . . .
. . . . . .
. . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . ......
Howrah General Hospital .. ... ... ...
1,311
233
257
78
35
28
12
3
Voluntary Lock-Hospitals, Calcutta
414
18
*Inclusive of cases treated in the ophthalmic ward.
27. Five hundred and sixty-one persons died in the wards of the Medical
College Hospital: of this number 80 were children. The death-rate of mixed
adults was 91.9 per mille. At the General Hospital the adult rate was 28.7 per
thousand, and among children 64.2—a very considerable reduction on the
figures recorded for 1884. At the Mayo Hospital the adult rate was 109.8 per
thousand, and that of children 120.3. Here, while the fall in the adult rate
was large, that among children rose 24 65 per male on the rate for 1884. At the
Campbell Hospital the adult rate was 214.2 per thousand, and that of children 152.4.
At Howrah the adult death-rate was 198.3 per thousand, and of children 238.1.
No less than 79 deaths are placed to moribunds. A large number of these cases
are brought in by the Police. Such cases are admitted in a separate building in
the hospital compound. It is quite apparent that sick paupers should not be