I have inserted from subsequent Parl? Returns the later figures for 1893-5). There Returns do not separate Hongkery & the Straits, and in what proportion we have no means of knowing.
The increase is at Haiphong & Singapore, but we can safely assume that there has been a marked increase at both places.
As to the Navy, we have no precise figures. As to the Civil population, the annual Reports of the Medical Depts for recent years also show a considerable increase of disease at Singapore, and at Hongkong, though in the latter case exact figures from ... are not given).
This appears to prove that from the health point of view, there has been a marked increase at both places.
But too much stress ought not to be laid on arguments derived from yearly figures (since disease fluctuates largely with or without C.D. Acts); and I refer to these figures for Secondary Syphilis, because the present agitation for the reintroduction of the C.D. system is largely based on the increase in the more serious forms of disease (secondary syphilis).
It therefore appears that the statistics do not support the contention that the C.D. Acts are not good. It also appears from p. 114 of his 1896 Report, that the disease can be combated by no other means than by C.D. Acts.
It is probable that it may be beneficial to the Straits & Hongkong. Total ... of the Dutch East Indies (where ... conditions are presumably different) were ... in my ... figures.
But on the other hand, it appears from the Army Returns referred to in ... that since the Acts were repealed in this country, there has been an actual diminution of disease in the Army. Again, comparing ... (a town where C.D. Act is in force) with ... disease has ...
I notice that there has been a diminution of disease, from 335 (per thousand) total admissions to 313 (per thousand). The Ceylon figures also show that whereas secondary syphilis went up alarmingly high in the two or three first years after the Repeal of the Acts, it has decreased gradually but satisfactorily.
I do not think that it is longer to foster ... on the side of morality in such mixed floating populations as those of Singapore, especially of Hongkong, more settled populations than among such ...; it is too soon to condemn the spread of the C.D. system, which has in Hongkong only been in force fully for 3 years, whereas the old system - involving actual licensing of brothels for a great part of the time about 30 years.
The moral results of such a system must continue for a long time after its repeal, and until the whole idea of "licensing of brothels" has disappeared from the general public opinion against it.
XCR(85)72, GR1178/1922/32(III)
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