Dr. Airy's report to the local government board on the sanitary state of the Neath registration district.

  • Airy, Hubert.
Date:
1877
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Dr. Airy's report to the local government board on the sanitary state of the Neath registration district. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service. The original may be consulted at London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service.

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    S8 2 suppose the same rate of increase to have been maintained since 1871, the population of the district may be estimated at 47,000. During the period of exceptional prosperity in the coal and iron trades, from 1872 to 1875, the population probably rose more rapidly than at other periods. The late Medical Officer of Health for the Neath Rural Sanitary District (Mr. E. R. Morgan) made a careful estimate of the population of every parish in his district for the year 1874, based upon the number of inhabited houses on the rate-book for that year and the average number of inhabitants per house as given at the census of 1871. I have used this estimate to check the population of the registration district as now constituted, and obtained confirmation within small limits of the estimate given in the preceding paragraph and of others which will be adopted in this report. The prevalent rates of mortality in the several sub-districts of the Neath Registration District, calculated from the Quarterly Returns issued by the Registrar-General, beginning with the year 1870, are shown in the following Table (I). The data for the Margam, Neath, and Ystradvelltey sub-districts extend over the seven years 1870-1876, and the population is estimated for the year 1873, as being the middle year of that period. For the Cadoxton sub-district, the limits of which were altered in 1875, and also for the whole registration district, the data can only be used for the five years 1870-1874, and the mean population is accordingly estimated for the year 1872. Table I.—Mortality from all Causes (in Sub-districts) . — Estimated Population. Margam, in 1873, 16,600. Neath, in 1873, 18,000. Ystradvelltey, in 1873, 3,660. Cadoxton, in 1872, 8,690. Whole District in 1872, 46,635. 1870 - 428 472 59 184 1,143 1871 - 323 514 82 204 1,123 1872 - 368 405 48 230 1,051 1873 - 366 381 64 193 1,004 1874 - 397 409 90 195 1,091 1875 - 366 554 85 [248] [1,253] 1876 - 319 373 62 [130] [884] (first five years) (first five years) Average of seven years 367 444 70 20i 1,082 Average death-rate per 1 1,000 living - J 22-1 24-7 19-1 23-1 23-2 The share which has been borne by diseases of the zymotic class in swelling the annual mortality (especially in the years 1870-72) will appear from subsequent tables. Among other causes of death tubercular diseases (especially phthisis), pulmonary inflam- mations (especially chronic bronchitis), and infantile convulsions are chiefly conspicuous in the local death-registers; to each of these three classes of disease is attributed an annual average of about 3'5 deaths for every 1,000 living. The prevalence of phthisis is probably to be taken in connexion with the excessive rainfall to which this part of the country is subject, and the general dampness of habitations.