The Birkenhead News and Wirral General Advertiser. — 1901-07-20 (Birkenhead, Merseyside, England)

THE HEALTH OF WIRRAL. MEDICAL OFTIIOT.E'S REPOT. SHELL FISH AND TYPHOID.  There is always useful and interesting information to be derived from ithe annual reports of the Medical Officer of Health for the County Palatine of Chester. The Report for 1900 has just been issued. From this it appears that the number of births registered in the Administrative County was 16,318, equal to 26.1 per 1,000 living. This is 0.3 lower than in 1899, 1.2 lower than in 1898, and 1.7 lower than in 1897. In the several parts of Wirral the birth rates were as follows: Wallasey district 30.1, Hoylake and West Kirby 19.7, Neston and Parkgate 28.1, Lower Bebingtou 29.4, Higher Bebington 28.4, Bromborough 17.7, Wirral (which includes the rural dietriots generally) 28.6. The number of deaths registered was 9,961, equal to a death-rate of 15.9 per 1,000 living. The range of the death-rate is considerable. While Stalybridge is highest with 22.4 per 1,000, Bromborough is lowest with only 8.8. In the thirty-three great towns in England and Wales the death-rate stood at 19.5. The detailed figures for the Wirral district are district 16.5, Hoylake and West Kirby 11.9, Heston and Parkgate 18.3, Lower B•bington 12.2, Higher Bebington 14.5, Bromborough 8.8, Wirral 14.3. It will thas be seen that Wallasey and Neaten and Parkgste are above the average for the whole county, and all the other parts are below it. Coming to the causes of death, it is satisfactory to note that none in Wirral are ascribed to smallpox. In Wallasey district 26 are due to measles, 22 to scarlet fever. 22 to epidemic influenza, 47 to phthisis, 60 to bronchitis, end 73 to pneumon:a. Phthiris accounts for 26 at Hoylake and Wed Kirby, 5 at Lower Bebington, and 4 at Neaten and Parkgate. At Lower Bebington, Higher Bebington, Bromborough, and Neaten and Parkgate there were no fatal cases of scarlet fever, and, excepting that there were two eases of enteric at Neaten and Parkeate, the same freedom prevails in respect to this and typhus. Of suicides there were 3 in Wallasey district and 1 at Hoylake and West Kirby. As to density of population, it appears that in Wallasey there are 15.25 persona to the acre, ih floylake and West Kirby 5.62, in Nestou and Parkgate 1.28, in Lower Bebington 8.06, in Higher Bebington 2.36, in Bromborough 1.18, and in rural Wirral 0.47. At first sight it seems odd that in Bromborough, with its 1.18 persons to the acre, there should have been two cases of overcrowding. Regurding the alleged association of shell-fish with enteric, the Medical Officer writes; "In the Wallasey Report is a circumstantial account of an outbreak of enteric fever traced to polluted oysters. In the autumn several persons who had attended a banquet and partaken of oysters had enteric fever, and one died from the disease; other persons who had also partaken of the oysters were made seriously ill. suffering from gastric and intestinal disorder. On inquiry it was found that the usters were dredged from beds in Dublin Bay, near which a large portion of the sewage of Dublin is said to be discharged. . . Then a report came from Liverpool that typhoid fever there had been traced to eating shell-fish (especially mussels and coceles) gathered on the tersey shore, particularly about New Brighton. Further inquiries were made, and the Medical Officer of Health was able to instance two eases where enteric fever followed the eating of such shell-fish gathered close to Egremont Fe:ry and eaten raw. One of these cases proved fatal. Notice boards were accordingly out up along the shore, warning people that ihe gathering of shell-fish between Seacombe Ferry and the rooks known_ as the 'Had Noses' was not permitted?' In the Wallasey Report there are also, we are told, some interesting notes of an outbreak of enteric fever associated with • certain milk supply. The dairy and the farm whence the milk came were examined, without throwing any light on the cause of the outbreak, but oa examining the sewer into which the dairy drained, it was found that just below the spot where the drains from the dairy entelei the pipes had sunk, causing a partial block in the sewer. The Surveyor was appealed to, and by May 12th ibis sewer was reconstructed. "Whether in some way contaminated gas found its way into the dairy so as to pollute the milk it iseimpossible to say, but certain it is that from the time the sewer was completed very few cases of typhoid fever derived from this dairy occurred, and only one occurred after June Bth." In all 22 eaees supplied with milk from this dairy were reported in the first six months of 1900.1 Bnterio fever appeared in another part of Wallasey in the autumn, viz., in Wheatlandlane and Oakdale, where the same fever has frequently °marred before. At Wheatlandlane, the Surveyor admitted "that there was no doubt the sewers were very old and defective, allowing much deposit to lie in them." Nothing has as yet been done, beyond cutting off the Wheatland-lane sewer from the dock sewer in Birkenhead-road, by a large syptp,a trap, but the Surveyor promises soon to begin the muoh-needed work of re-construction. At Oakdale it was found "that the intercepting sewer carrying off the drainage from this dietriot had become completely blocked owing to the collapse of a portion of the sewer at a point where some pipes had got broken. The effect of this was to dam back both sewage and sewer 213 along the sewer, entering above the bloek, and to retain infected material until the block was cleared." The work of re-construction here the Surveyor undertakes to Sea carried out during 1901. It is also mentioned that in Wallasey all cams of infectious I:Limited are notified to the Free Public Library, and during 1900 a special chamber was provided in which infected books have been since disinfected by formic aldehyde. Many valuable books have been diainfeeted in this apparatus, and in no instance hie; damage been done. With reference to the prevalence of peripheral neuritis, the Medical Officer stit•!.3 t:,ere have been some esses,nomber not h:von, in Bastham and Neaten. He men'ims that one patient from the Nomtvich Rural District, was a teetotaller, and the cause of neuritis was probably exposure to cold. There is much else in the volume of interest relating to sewage, workmen's dwellings, water supply, food adniteratian, and, not the least, the treatment of infants, in which minute directions as to feeding, washing, clothing and training are given by Dr, Vacher, which it may be hoped, in the interest of the rising generation, the mothers of Wirral will study and adopt. •  For She latsaii designs ia blethle aad Gilt and Drawing and Dining Room Cloaks, Mapes* the stook of William Pyke, which inelud• desiene specially houghs from Pan; Exhibition, 1900 Sinking Cloaks from 30e., at Pyke's, Clock Importer, Birkenhead Telephone 403. an