[Report 1958] / Medical Officer of Health, Loughborough Borough.

  • Loughborough (England). Borough Council.
Date:
1958
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: [Report 1958] / Medical Officer of Health, Loughborough Borough. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    6/38 (page 2)
    ANNUAL REPORT - 1958' To The Mayor, Aldermen and Councillors of the Borough of Loughborough. Your Worship, Ladies and Gentlemen, I have the honour to present my 22nd. Annual Report on the health of your Borough. i Details of the various aspects of the work of the Health Department- are given under their several headings and I will refer only to a few salient points here. 12 deaths of infants under one year of age produced an infant mortality rate of 20.5 per 1000 live births as compared with a provisional rate of 22.5 for England and Wales. Contrary to our experience in the past few years only four of these deaths were in the first month of life and due to congenital causes or prematurity. I\lo less than five others were due to infections of the respiratory system, an unusually high figure. But for these the rate would have been even less than last year’s which was the lowest on record. The greatly improved condition of young children today as compared with those of even 20 years ago is obvious to anyone engaged in work among them. They are better nourished, more suitably clad and have an appearance of well being that testifies to the higher standards of child care and management of the mother of today and her ability to make use of her better material resources for the welfare of her children, and her willingness to take advantage of the services which are available to assist her. In my report for 1957 I commented on the relatively small number of measles cases during the year although, for the country as a whole, this was an epidemic year, and hinted that we might in consequence have a local epidemic in 1958. This in fact proved to be the case and in the year under review 656 cases were notified - almost two and a half times as many as in 1957.- No cases of poliomyelitis occurred during the year. Vaccination against this disease continues and a considerable proportion of children have now been protected. The Ministry of Health decided during the year to extend the age limit of eligibility for vaccination to 25 years, but up to the end of the year the response from the age group 16—25 was most disappointing. At the time of writing however it is known that the position for 1959 is likely to show a considerable improvement. -2-