The number of sick is still high, and it is expected to continue so, as long as no improvement is made in the quarters provided for them, the Central Station, for them, the Central Station, at 3, 7 & 8 Stations and the Police Hulk being the most noteworthy for their crowded and unwholesome condition. Aberdeen Station has been better this year, there having been only 17 admissions to Hospital from this Station, as compared with 32 in 1880; this Station generally sends in fever cases of the worst type, but the improvements made seem to have had a good effect on the health of the men stationed there of late: I find also that the Police are not provided with water-proof coats, so that they are often wet through day after day in the rainy season, another reason for so much sickness amongst them.
TROOPS.
Sickness among the troops seems to be still on the increase, the admissions to Hospital in 1881 being 1,116 as compared with 1,075 in 1880.
The number of admissions to Hospital and deaths for the last nine years are shown below.
1873..... 1,446 12
1874... 1,067 10
1875.. 716 9
1876. 563 2
1877.. 973 9
1878.... 944 10
1879... 1,035 13
1880. 1,075 4
1881. 1,116
I think that three things may have something to say for this increase, and those are the amount of undergrowth or jungle on the hill sides above the barracks on the south side of the Queen's Road, of which there seems to me far too much, and should, I think, be cleared away periodically; another is the fouling of the streams by the washermen, some of which are now little better than large open sewers; and as regards the barracks on the north side of the Queen's Road, the drainage surrounding them and opening into the sea on the Praya from which the most unbearable and unwholesome stenches proceed at low tide.
GOVERNMENT CIVIL HOSPITAL.
This Establishment still occupies both the old and the new Lock Hospitals. Though these buildings are far superior to those used in previous years for the purpose, they are by no means sufficient in accommodation or fitted for a purpose for which they were never designed. The plans sanctioned some four years ago by Sir MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH for the new Government Civil Hospital have not been carried out or anything been done towards it. Repairs and many things required have been put off time after time, the proposed plans for the new Establishment always being expected to be shortly proceeded with. As concerns the new Lock Hospital, instead of water closets, earth closets were ordered without consulting the Medical Department, with a result that is both unpleasant and certainly prejudicial to the patients, there being no urinals either. It is not to be expected that a patient suffering and often in great pain should trouble himself about dry earth; it is impossible unless the staff already large is largely increased to keep men continually on the watch at these closets; the consequence is the dry earth system is so incompletely carried out as to become comparatively useless. The pans provided as urinals the patients never trouble to pick up, but use standing, and more often the drain trap of the bath room is used as a urinal; the consequence is that the floors and walls of the closets are always polluted with urine and the whole place becomes disgustingly offensive notwithstanding the frequent use of disinfectants. To keep these closets in anything like order, there ought to be a man looking after each of them night and day, and this would necessitate a staff of sixteen men alone to work these closets only. I pointed them out to Mr. CHADWICK, the late Sanitary Commissioner sent from Home, and he entirely agreed with me that such contrivances were most unsuitable for a Hospital. Sir MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH in his dispatch gave special directions concerning the construction of the Hospital water closets and latrines, but none of these have as yet been carried out. I regret not being able to coincide with Surgeon-Major MURRAY, the Acting Superintendent, that the dry earth closets have acted even "fairly well" for the reasons I have given above as well as for those he gives himself.
There is another matter to which I wish to call attention and that is the number of severe injuries in the way of contusions, fractures, and wounds admitted to the Hospital of late years, many of which come from aboard ship and are the result of injuries received while in a state of drunkenness, from falls from the rigging or down hatchways, or in drunken brawls in which any weapon that comes to hand, such as sailors' sheath knife, marlin spikes, &c., is used. The chief way liquor is obtained by seamen is...