5
tors belonging to District Boards, Local Bodies were urged either to appoint
their own vaccinator or, with the permission of the Civil Surgeon, to place the
Medical Officer of the local hospital or dispensary in charge of vaccination.
As a means of judging roughly of the relative thoroughness of vaccination
Medical Officers of Health and District Health Officers were required at the
end of each vaccination season to submit the ' Vaccination Index " (as defined
in the last year's report) of the areas under their control. Finally the attention
of the Assistant Directors of Public Health and other inspecting officers was
drawn to the importance of inspecting the arrangements for vaccination and of
checking the vaccination state of towns and villages during the course of their
tours.
Number of vaccina-
tions.
Statement No. I.
6. The total number of primary vaccinations and re-vaccinations carried
out by all establishments during the year 1924-25 was 958,512 as compared
with 943,263 daring the previous year. This represents an increase of 15,249
vaccinations, but as the operation had to be repeated in the case of 304 persons
the total number
of persons
vaccinated was 958,208. Of
the
957,531 persons vaccinated by the vaccinators employed by District Boards,
Municipal Committees, Special Staff and Cantonment Staff, 547,861 were
males and 469,670 were females but since there were 112.9 male births to
every 100 female births in the year 1924 it would be anticipated, assuming
that males and females were vaccinated in proportion to their number, that
485,262 females instead of 409,670 females would have been vaccinated. As
male and female infants are presented for vaccination with equal readiness it
must be assumed that relatively few adult females underwent re-vaccination.
This presumption is borne out by the fact that, in the case of males, the
number of re-vaccinations constituted 69.75 per cent. of the total number of
males vaccinated whilst the corresponding figure in the case of females was
30.25 per cent.
Primary Vaccination.—The total number of primary vaccinations carried
out by all establishments was 670,640 as compared with 674,203 or a decrease
of 3,563 as compared with the previous year. The total number of primary
operations carried out by the District and Municipal staff was 639,205 as com-
pared with 639,908 in the year 1923-24—a small decrease of 703.
Re-vaccinations.—On the other hand the re-vaccination figures for the
current year show an increase of 18,812, the actuals being 287,872 during the
year 1924-25 as compared with 269,060 in the year 1923-24. The total number
of re-vaccinations carried out by the District and Municipal vaccination staff
was 239,632 in the year under review as compared with 251,509 during the
previous year or a decrease of 11,877.
It is therefore disappointing to find, in spite of efforts made to
improve vaccination, that the number of vaccinations performed by the
Municipal and District Board staff shows a decline both as regards primary
and re-vaccinations as compared with the previous year. Various causes contri-
bute to this state of affairs. In the first place the number of births during
the year 1921 was 63,902 less than in the previous year; secondly an
epidemic of plague, more espcially in Multan City, disorganised the vaccina-
tion arrangements for several months; thirdly there is still much apathy
on the part of local bodies towards vaccination ; fourthly, active opposition on
the part of disaffected persons was occasionally encountered. Finally, for
reasons which will be mentioned later, it is yet too soon to expect an appre-
ciable increase in vaccination as the result of the measures brought into
operation during the year under review.
District
and
Municipal
staff.
Statement No. II.
7. The number of Superintendents of Vaccination of which there
is one in each district (except in Lahore and Multan where there are two was
reduced by one owing to the retirement of the Superintendent of Vaccination,
Simla Municipality and his replacement by a vaccinator. The total number of
vaccinators employed by local bodies was 306 as compared with 296 in the
previous year. The increase is due to the entertainment of four additional
vaccinators in Montgomery District, three in Gurdaspur, two in Rawalpindi
and one each in Ambala, Simla, Jullundur, Ferozepore and Multan. There
was a reduction of two vaccinators in Shahpur District and one each in Sialkot