ANNUAL
VACCINATION REPORT
BIHAR AND ORISSA
FOR THE YEAR
1920-21.
1. Staff.—Dr. S. N. Tiwari was in charge of the Department from 1st April
to 11th October 1920 and Major W. C. Ross, I.M.S., from the 12th October 1920
to 31st March 1921.
The office of the Deputy Sanitary Commissioner, North Bihar Circle, was
held by Dr. B. P. Muzumdar throughout the year except for two months and
seventeen days when he was on privilege leave and Dr. T. Sebastian remained
in charge of the Chota Nagpur and Orissa Circle and in supervising charge of
the Vaccine Depôt during the year except for five months and ten days when
he also availed himself of privilege leave and was on special duty at Bhagalpur.
The office of the Deputy Sanitary Commissioner, South Bihar Circle, was held
by Dr. S. N. Tiwari throughout the year except for a period of less than four
months when Dr. C. Trivedi was officiating as Deputy Sanitary Commissioner.
The inspecting staff consisted of 20 District Inspectors of Vaccination
and 68 Sub-Inspectors of Vaccination (including three deputed for duty at the
Vaccine Depôt), in addition to the two Sub-Assistant Surgeons combining vacci-
nation inspection with other duties in Angul. The total number of vaccinators
employed in the Province during the year was 1,088 licensed and 227 paid,
against 1,067 licensed and 221 paid in the previous year.
In Municipalities and in the district of Puri, vaccination was done by
paid vaccinators; but otherwise the work throughout the Province was carried
out under the licensing system, except for the employment of paid vaccinators
by District Boards, and employed temporarily by Civil Surgeons for short
periods to deal with outbreaks of small-pox.
In previous years vaccination in Angul was carried out by paid vaccina-
tors, but the licensing system was introduced during the year under report.
2. Operations performed.—The total number of operations performed during
the year amounted to 1,060,485 as compared with 1,054,905 last year. The
increase amounts to 5,580, which is not very satisfactory as compared with
the previous year. Many reports were received of the unwillingness of the
people to have their children vaccinated, and of increasing difficulties
in realizing fees. As the year was a healthy one, these difficulties cannot be
attributed to the prevalence of epidemic disease. They are probably to some
extent of an economic nature and due to the increased cost of living, but also
to a considerable extent due to political propaganda. Of the total number
of operations in the Province, 1,041,481 were performed by the Vaccination
Department as compared with 1,020,630 last year. 966,334 operations were
primary and 75,147 revaccinations as against 920,075 primary and 100,555
revaccinations last year.
There was an increase of 46,259 in the primary operations and decrease
of 25,408 in revaccinations during the year. Of the total operations performed
(1,041,481), 1,002,986 equal to 96.29 per cent. were successful as compared
with 975,537 equal to 95.58 last year. The number of operations performed
in Municipalities fell by 13,184 as compared with last year's returns. The
total number of operations performed was 43,903 and the number of successful
operations was 36,870, of which 31,541 were primary and 5,329 were
revaccinations as compared with 35,428 and 10,372 respectively last year.