The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1844-05-14 00:00:00

STATISTICS OF MORTALITY.

A Quarterly Table of the Mortality of 115 of the dis-
tricts of England (including the principal towns) has just
been published by authority of the Registrar-General,
together with tables showing the increase or decrease as
compared with former periods. The total population of
these districts in 1841 was 6,578,912; the average deaths
of five winter quarters (1838-42) was 45,351; and the
total deaths in the winter quarter ending 31st March,
1844, were 46,041. The population of Liverpool and the
adjoining West Derby district was in 1811 conjointly
310,706, and the mortality of the quarter ending 31st
March last was 2,572, being a very small increase on the
average mortality of winter in the same districts. In
Preston the deaths had decreased. In Manchester, the
population of which in 1841 was 192,408, the deaths in the
last quarter, ending 31st March, were 1,541 ; and in
Salford (population 70,228) 502—rather less than the aver-
age of the previous five winters. Taking the whole of the
115 districts, the deaths were G9O above the average of the
winter quarters of 1838-42; but 400 of the excess being
subtracted for the additional day in leap year, 290 of in-
crease only are left. The population (it is remarked) has
been found at all the censuses to be increasing rapidly in
the town districts, partly by the excess of births over
deaths, and partly by immigration. The population of 59
of the most populous districts in the return increased at
the rate of 6.3 per cent. every four years from 1831 to 1841,
and it is probable that the increase was not less than 5 per
cent. in the four years from the winter quarter of 1840 to
that of 1844. The average with which the 46,041 (less 400)
deaths in the quarter ending March 31st, 1814, should
consequently be compared is 47,619. The metropolis has
been less healthy than in previous years ; but the mor-
tality is not so much above the average as in the autumn
quarter of 1843. It is stated that 252 persons died of
small pox, which was fatal to only 114 in the preceding
autumn quarter. The great majority of these persons
were children that had not been vaccinated. Measles and
scarlatina were declining. Influenza, bronchitis, and
pneumonia destroyed more than the average number in
the metropolis ; and their fatality, particularly among the
aged, is noticed in many of the reports from the other
districts. The deaths registered from dropsy, cancer,
scrofula, heart disease, apoplexy, and paralysis were above
the average number; those from childbirth, as well as
violent and sudden deaths, were below the average. We
find here a quarterly meteorological table introduced,
compiled from weekly tables supplied by the Astronomer-
Royal. This shows, by comparison with Mr. Henry's
observations, that the mean temperature of the air has
been a little below that of the season. We notice among
the districts in which the mortality was higher than the
average mortality of winter in the stone districts—Brigh-
ton, Winchester, St. Albans, Wycombe, Cambridge,
Yarmouth, Exeter, Birmingham, Coventry, Lincoln,
Wigan, Anglesea, &c. ; and amongst those in which the
mortality was lower—the Central Districts of the Metro-
polis, Cheltenham, Walsall, Wolverhampton, Stockport,.
Macclesfield, Preston, Bolton, Prescot, Manchester,
Salford, Sheffield, Leeds, Sunderland, Gateshead, New-
castle-on-Tyne, Cockermouth, and Pontypool. The
average of deaths amongst children from small pox ap-
pears to be on the increase—chiefly owing to the neglect
of parents in not resorting to vaccination.