The Express.
London, England, 1849-11-29 00:00:00

REPORT PROM TO■ MODICA!. OFFICIO OP RIALTO.

The CHAIRMAN stated that sines the committee had
IRO assembled, Mr Simon, the medical officer of health, had
made a report of the most important kind to the Commis-
goners of Sewers, and it was considered inexpedient to call
a me-ting of the City arard of Healls pending the (Lica-
ri in of ite merits. Taal report, however, having been re-
ferred to a committee appointed by the commissioners, and
copies of the report having been forwarded to the members of
the corporation, there was no longer any occasion to delay
the ceremony f assembling on general Weans.
Mr. SIMON stated to the committee that the statement
which he had made three works ago to the Commissioners
of &were was intended for the Committee of Health es well

as for the former body. He had made some additional re-
m•rks seising from subsequent occurrences, and ha would
read them to the committee :
TO THE HEALTH COMMITTZI OF THI COMMON COUNCIL

OP 1111 CITY OF LONDON.
Lancaster-place, Nov. 28, 1849.
Gentlemen,—l have the honour of submitting to you the
py of a statement which I laid before the commissioners of
sewers three weeks ago, and which was frailest as a report to
be made to your committee conjointly with that court. It
eiseusees at considerable length the general sanitary affairs
rat th • City, not only in regard to matters provided for in the
.wen Act of parliament, but likewise in regard of other
evils hitherto untouched by the law ; particularly I may men-
tion that, in accordance with your desire, I have awed
my views on the subject of intramural burials ; and while
I here considered myself restricted to the semi.
tan Marines of this subject and to a general
ote line of remedial mearures required, the City so-
liciror ha., I hellin' matured for sour consideration the
details of • plan for extramural 'stemmata. I Meet
yen will concur en the opinion which guided me la the ems-
struction of my report, that is my uncertainty hew ease el
the great sanitary reform might devolve on rue ewe te ao.
cemplish, and how mach on another, it would be mast see.
venie nt for those interested in the question that I should
make my report a single one, te:erable to both jurisdictions,
rather loan endeavour to divide a subject which naturally
hangs together, and where the various parts contribute to ex-
plain and qualify each other. Having already reported to
ion amply on the arrangements of the household visitation
edopted under your auspices, and on the success of those ar-
range meats, it remains for me only to inform you that,
according to your desire, the visitation ceased oa
the 131 ultimo, having then continued in fora
for a month. During that period of anxiety
and alarm, upwards of 5.600 families were visited daily be
the preventive medical staff; 2,4i3 eases of epidemic diar-
ekes were discovered and bioeght under treatment,
cases differing in their severity, bat including a very large
number of the severest deseripti n previously without medi-
cal tro ttment, and probably aggravate t by neglect ; 32 cases
nnly terminated in choler,. In the height of the epidemic
more than 200 eises of dierrhcce were discovered in a der,
and nearly 480 cans were under treatment at • time. It will
be obvious to your committee that these numbers refer to
cases beyond the ordinary medical practice of the
Ca., ; cases brought to light solely by the house-
boll visitation, haying previously been without me.
tied treatmont ; and that they are in consequence
exclusive of all came which bad made voluntary
appreetions for medical assistance. The medical *fillers of
the Ci•y unions, on whose valuable services have already '
more than once reported to piny committee, during all the
period invited applications from the suffering poor by night
es well as by day, letting it be thoroughly undentood that
they were as accessible at one time as at another.
Printed notices were diffused as extensively as possible
among the poorer population of the City, and in cense-
quer en of this arrangement nocturnal applications for
ether became very inquest. The same gent'. men
likewiso sat plied all medlines and other means
and appUst.c-s which the household visitation syn.
dared necessary ; and thus, in addition to their sepsis
tend-nee and aid in the visitation, and in addition, alto, to
their habitual attendance at our medical committee in the
Guildhall, incurred consilerable labour sod expense, which
our committee no doubt would wish to be informed oe and
which I therefore take this opportunity of bringing under
your notice. I must beg leave, gentlemen, to repeat, in the
eronzest manner, my conviction that • very important ger
Lee was rendered to the population of the City by the
coone you thought it right to adopt in the matter of the
household visitation. Not only were very many cases ef disease
bra ught under medical treatment which otherwise, in all
human probability, would have died for the want of it,
but a general feeling of confidence and 1011201fative
security was given to the public of the City by
the knowledge of your exertions for their welfare.
This desirable result was additionally promoted by the very
iwticieus address which your committee caused to be °into
lased in exponation of your proposed m• anwes, at the tires
of the greatest panic and Manse. The cholera bevies ap-
parently passed for the present season, it becomes impera-
tively necessary that inquiry should be made, by what means
the renewed visitation of so dreadful a plsgue may best be
obviated. Experience has shown that when the patience
is at our thresholds the time for preventien has passed ; but
now, fresh from its awful pretense, and with the nee it
knowledee of the misery which attended it, we are better
qualified than under ordinary circumstances to reflect gene-
rally on the conditions which determine our Hell civic
mortality and which render the City so accessible to epi-
demic diem.. These are the subjects on which I have
entered at length in my annual report, and I therefore re-
frain from dwelling on them now. It will suffice that I
should remind yes that cholera mast new be considered a
disease of periodical recurrence here, that it is impossible to
predict how long it may remain absent from oar shores, or
with what modification of severity it may revisit them. Me-
dical science is quite incompetent to foretell whether the
diva e may recur next year, or may wait a longer interval
and give us ampler leisure for resistance, nor as we
venture to decide whether. in the absence of sanitary im-
provements, it might not visit tee with a constant progression
of frequency aid fierceness, and at last perhaps become, like
typhus, the habitual desolator of the poor.; nor can I refrain
from reminding you of another epidemic—the infi
wouch stands in some mysterious connexion with the recent
one, and which is at ones little less fatal than it, and far
more frequent in its invaaions—against these diseases
and equally against the unremitting plainest of typhus
and scrofula, which fill our register of mortality
with the record M so much premature death, the pre-
sent is the time to strive; therefore it is that I have
considered the chess of the epidemic period an appropriate
occasion for bringing under review the satire sanitary rela-
tions of the City as in the report which I submit to you ; end
for the same reason I consider the opportunity alpenhorn '
....plaints for the establishment of some permanent Board of
Health within the City, which may habitually maintain
under its consideration all the great questions of senisan
lioprovements ; may watch over the public health during all
per eels as vigilantly and effectually as your committee bee
watched during the last three moatha ; and may be ready
at the recurrence of any such calamitous period,
Ito advise and to initiate all needful measures of
Prevention and relief without the delay and the
liability to conflict of jurisdictions which are almost insepa-
rable from extemp treasons arrangesni its. I hope, gentle•
men, in conclusion' that I may be permitted to express to
you my own grateful acknowledgments for the extreme
kindness and courtesy with which you have been pleased to
neat me during my temporary connexion with your com-
mittee, and which have rendered it no less a pleasure than
en honour to me, that during this fearful and laborious
period I have had the opportunity of co-operating to the
extent ef my humble abilities with the humane and en-
ligh•ened exertions of the Health Committee of the Common
Council —I have the boaour to be. etc , Joint Simon.
Toe report WIN received with the strongest masks of sp.
probation.

SODDEN DEATH OF Ma. TURQIIAND. OFFICIAL ;
Asst.:um.—Yesterday morning, about half-put eleven
o'clock, Mr. Turquand, one of the official assignees in the
Court of Mr. Cummissionir Shepherd, died suddenly. It
appear. that he left home at Norwood in his usual health,
and nn al uhting from the omnibus at the corner of Bircbin-
lane an I King William-stmt. he bit unwell, and went into
a chemi.t's sbrp, and whilst waiting for a dose to be made
up, he suddenly fell off the chair ; and although prompt
assistance was rendered, he expired is a few minutes. Mr.
Turquand had been ono of the Akita assignees since the
act for their appointment came into operation, and by his
death a third vacancy =AM und• r the new act—no vacancies
b- log Mien up until the rtine,ec of official aseigneta is below
right. Mr. Payne held an inquest on the body last '
night, and the einem' utters atte..ding. the learned gentle-
Tan's da"h havin,, ,een detailed, the jury returned a vet-
diet to the eff. et tr,at the melancholy event was occasioued
by spasm et UV. heart.