88
"The total Northern District recorded population was 69 thousand in 1911, and 699 thousand in 1921 (including the boat-people), suggesting, at 35 births per thousand, about 2420-2450 births a year, of which half (1210-1225) would be male.
The 1921 figures for women aged 10-14, 15-19, 25-29, 30-34 do not show the same pattern as the 1911 figures did for the same group a decade earlier; in 1921 these groups, namely 4,380, 3,390, 2,792 and 2,616, thus making it very likely that the differences were due to under-reporting, given the static nature of the population.
The figures in Table 7 take no account of emigration from the area which would reduce the resident adult male population (particularly between ages 20 and 40). Emigration was a significant social feature (it is discussed more fully below), but does not make the very rough figures in Table 7 substantially inaccurate.
42 Death-rates, of course, differed much more on a year-by-year basis than today. Epidemic disease (smallpox especially) killed many children, but smallpox struck only one year in every 3 or 4. Malaria and dysentery, the other major killers of children after neo-natal infections, were more endemic as problems. The Census officer in 1921 discussed death-rates within the New Territories, but, presumably because he was aware of the problem of under-reporting of children, he limited himself to the death-rates of persons aged over 25, pointing out that the death rates of males between 25 and 50 were double those of England and Wales at the same date, and were 50% higher for females. Between 50 and 60, death rates in the New Territories were, he found, 1.4 times those in England and Wales and rather higher than this for females. The percentage of the population still alive at age 60 in the New Territories was less than half that in England and Wales for males, and barely half for females (Census Report 1921, page 161, para 8).
55
Papers Laid Before the Legislative Council of Hongkong, 1900. (Sessional Papers), printed by Noronha and Co, Government Printers, No 8, "Report of the Acting Principal Civil Medical Officer for the Year 1900. Laid Before the Legislative Council by Command of His Excellency the Governor", p. 253, 1902. No 37, p 729, 1905, No 15, p 266, 1906. No 14, p 350, 1907. No 27, p 459, 1908, No. 21, p 459, etc., Administrative Reports for the Year 1909, p K54-6, 1910 p L51-52, 1911 p L61, 1912, p L60-61, 1913, p. L61-62, 1914. p L63. 1915, p M57-58, etc. A short history of medical provision in the New Territories is in Administrative Reports for the Year 1932, p M103-104.
55
21
Reductions in infant, especially neo-natal, mortality in the market-towns between 1911 and 1921 were certainly less than the numbers of infants not reported to the Census, and thus are invisible in the statistics.
The 4.3% reduction the loss of Tsuen Wan implied was offset, to a large extent, by the 1921 higher figures for the boat people. Between these two factors, the 1921 figures would be expected to be lower than the 1911 figures by about 1-2%.
~ Administrative Reports for the Year 1920 page O29-30