355
These have been computed by the Assistant Registrar General to amount to no less than 537 for the year 1896, so that if we take this estimate as correct, the Chinese births will number 1,515, and the general birth-rate of the Colony will be 6.3 per 1,000.
DEATHS.
The total number of deaths registered was 5,860, of which 5,607 were Chinese; this is equal to a total death-rate of 24.5 per 1,000 as compared with 21.65 per 1,009 during the preceding year and an average of 22.65 per 1,000 during the past five years (exclusive of 1891); excluding the deaths from Bubonic Fever the death rate stands at 19.9 per 1,000; the death-rate among the Chinese alone was 24.73 per 1,000. The deaths registered among the non-Chinese community numbered 253, which gives a death-rate of 19 per 1,000 while the corresponding death-rate during 1895 was 17.6 per 1,000.
This augmentation of the death-rate is due to the epidemic of Bubonic Fever which prevailed during the greater part of the year and which is accountable for no less than 1,078 deaths, or 18.4 per cent of the total deaths registered during the year.
"C
The death rate among the Chinese community is, as I pointed out in my Report for 1895, un- doubtedly considerably augmented by the ignorance of the Chinese in regard to the remedial treatment of disease, and this is at present still further accentuated by the entire absence of any control by the Government over the native practitioners in the Colony. In January 1896 I submitted a Report to the Sanitary Board pointing out the great desirability of registering and licensing these Chinese doctors, for by such means a check could be kept upon the sale and administration of poisons and also upon the practice of those remnants of barbarism which still pass muster as good surgery" among the exponents of Eastern medicine; this Report was adopted by the Board and forwarded for the information of His Excellency the Governor together with an expression of the Board's opinion that the proposed system of registration was a matter which deserved early attention, and I have reason to believe that it is still receiving the consideration of the Government. The regis tration of native midwives was also urged by me in the same Report, for the death-rate among the infant population of the Colony is one of the most alarming features of our mortality statistics, and although it would appear that much greater difficulty will be experienced in reaching these midwives than is likely to occur in the case of the so-called doctors, yet I am convinced that strict supervision of this branch of medical practice is urgently needed, and that by a little judicious control the infant death-rate of the Colony can be materially diminished.
DISTRIBUTION OF DEATHS.
The number of deaths occurring in the Army during the year was 18, of which 12 were of British soldiers, the remainder being Indians. The average age at death was 27 years and the causes of death were as follows:-
Bubonic Fover, Sporadic Cholera, Enteric Fever,......
Syphilis,
BRITISH.
Brought forward..........
7
1
Privation,
1
Cirrhosis of liver,
1
1
Atrophy,
1
"J
Heat Apoplexy,
1
Cancer,
1
19
Heart Disease,..
1
Hepatitis,
1
Carried forward,.
7
Total..............
...12
INDIAN.
Bubonic Fever,
1
Phthisis,
1
Pneumonia,
1
1
1
i Fracture of Skull,
Enteritis, Dysentery,
Not one of the three men who died of Bubonic Fever was among those employed by the Sanitary Board for house to house visitation, and the most probable explanation is therefore that they con- tracted the disease in some Chinese house of entertainment. The death from Privation was that of a private who deserted while insane, and whose body was found, some weeks afterwards, upon the bill-side.
A large proportion of the deaths among the British soldiers are from diseases of the liver, as is usual in tropical climates.
Four deaths occurred in the Navy during the year, the causes of which were as follows:- Small-pox,
Enteric Fever,.
1
Rheumatism, Cancer of liver,
1
1
The deaths of persons other than Chinese employed in the Mercantile Marine and foreign Navies, were 32 in number; of these 13 were British, 5 were German, 4 Malay, 3 Indian, 2 Siamese, 2 Portuguese, 1 Russian, 1 Dutch and I American.
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