The following table shows the number and classification of those brought to Hospital for the last
seven years :-
**
1882.
1883.
1884.
1885.
1886.
1887.
Police,
.549
599
486
495
602
619
Board of Trade,..........116 Private paying Patients, 268
110
60
100
132
103
260
259
283
381
324
Government Servants,... 88
105
96
124
144
147
Police Cases,.............. .207
227
231
238
142
208
Destitutes,
....230
201
222
270
222
255
1,458
1,502
1,354
1,510
1,623
1,656
The increase in the number of admissions is principally among two classes. Police cases, an in- crease of 66 as compared with 1886. Destitutes, an increase of 27.
The admissions and deaths in Hospital for the last ten years are as follows:-
1878,
1879,....
1880,.
1881.
1882,.....
1883,
1884,
1885,
1886,
會
• 1887,
"
Admissions.
Deaths.
.1,289.
.50
1,071.
..55
J
1,055.....
1,236...
..44
..49
.1,458.....
.1,502.
...68
..70
.1,354.....
.50
.1,510.........
.76
.1,623.. .1,656.................
79
..89
The percentage of deaths relative to admissions was 5.37, the highest percentage in the last 10 years. Eighteen deaths were from injuries received, six of them were fractured skulls, and three from burns.
SMALL-POX HOSPITAL.
Small-pox became epidemic in the Colony towards the latter end of November, and between the 22nd of that month and the end of the year 40 cases had already been admitted to Hospital. The accommodation not being sufficient for the demand, three large matsheds were improvised and enclosed in the Hospital grounds and a Police Guard had to be put over them. Dr. ATKINSON had charge of these inflammable temporary buildings and they caused him no small anxiety in consequence of the dangers of fire to which they were several times exposed from the flying sparks of houses burning below the Hospital. In three months, ie: December 1887, January and February 1888, there were over 100 small-pox cases admitted to Hospital. For the use of European females I utilized the female ward of the Lunatic Asylum which happened to be vacant at the time. I had personal charge of these cases, of which three were only varioloid, and none very severe.
Table VIIa shows the number of small-pox cases, the nationality of the patients admitted in 1887, and the dates of their admission. There were 65 cases in all, of these 11 died.
The Medical Members and Secretary of the Sanitary Board together with the Registrar General met and made arrangements for daily vaccinations in different parts of the Colony and at all the Hospitals. All the prisoners in the Gaol were vaccinated and every one admitted to Gaol now is vaccinated.
Government orders have been given that all new members joining the Police Force shall be vacci- nated. There was an extraordinary demand for vaccine lymph, and as it soon got very scarce it had to be husbanded with great care. The best vaccine that was procured was calf lymph from Japan which was excellently put up for travelling and arrived in very good condition, it was used with excellent results. There are very few Europeans now in the Colony that have not been vaccinated or revaccinated and if there are it is not from any want of facilities.
Another result of the recent experience was a recommendation from the Sanitary Board that the small-pox Hospitals both for Europeans and Chinese be removed to the outskirts of the City of Victoria. Small-pox is endemic among the Chinese in the winter months and notwithstanding all safeguards and precautions must inevitably be imported into the Colony by them. The recommendation therefore is one deserving of earnest attention. The Sanitary Board also drew up a set of rules and precautions to be followed on the appearance of small-pox in private tenements, this list was printed in English and Chinese and freely circulated and the Sanitary Inspectors visited all houses where cases occurred and saw the instructions of the Board carried out.
The Chinese Washermen were also instructed in the disinfecting of wash-clothes in boiling water and Jeyes' Disenfecting Fluid and the latter was supplied to them the Sanitary Inspectors seeing that the instructions for its use were carried out.