160
at home.
I am not prepared to recommend an expenditure of over £500 a year for the services a Surgeon. which are so rarely required; the risk that is run is no more than is incurred in many County Hospitals In the largest work-house infirmaries at home there is only one resident Surgeon, and in many there is no resident Surgeon. In the largest Gaols at home there is only one resident Surgeon, The though their infirmaries often have more than fifty beds, and the work is far more arduous. wealthiest man must run this risk, even when retaining his own private Surgeon; he may not be on the spot at the moment his services are required.
There
The situation chosen for the Hospitals is as good as could be procured in the Colony. The new Lock Hospital will not, as formerly, be visible from the upper roads, and very few Europeans make use of that part of the Queen's Road from which it is visible or the women approach the Hospital. are few visitors to the Hospital in the morning when the women attend at the Lock, and they are not of a class likely to be shocked by the sight of them. Some nuisances are unavoidable; the new build- ings cannot be constructed without noise, and if the Hospital were so far removed from the working part of the town as to be beyond reach of noise, it would be so much farther for the sick to come or be brought.
Table V shows the diseases of those admitted to Hospital during the year, as usual. Fevers and bowel complaints are most numerous, and after them diseases of the chest.
Table VII shows the number of admissions during each month of the year, which were greatest in the months of May, July, August and October. The total admissions were 1,071 as compared with 1,287 in 1878; the deaths being 55 this year and 50 last.
Table VIII shows the number of dead bodies brought to the Hospital; the number increased by one as compared with 1878.
SMALL POX HOSPITAL.
At the beginning of the year some rooms in the ruins of the old Civil Hospital were used as a Small Pox Hospital, and it was then in charge of Dr. WHARRY, but these ruins being pulled down at the end of this year, an old house in Ilollywood Road was made use of, and as it was a considerable distance off the Hospital, I took charge. Now a good airy building is provided on a site not far from the Civil Hospital, and Dr. WHARRY again has charge. There were thirteen admissions and one death as compared with seven admissions and no deaths in 1878.
VICTORIA GAOL.
There has been a considerable increase in the number of admissions to the Gaol Hospital, and a great increase in the number of sick altogether, but I am happy to say a great decrease in the mortality; only six deaths against fourteen last year.
A great
number of Europeans suffered from Diarrhoea, but these were principally merchant seamen who had been leading a riotous life on shore and were arrested for drunkenness.
Among the Chinese prisoners there are a great number of half starved and debilitated creatures, who have to be taken into Hospital in many cases at once, on admission to Gaol, and some serve nearly their whole time in Hospital; these furnish the cases of Fever, Diarrhoea, Anaemia and Debility. There was a considerable outbreak of Mumps in the Gaol; 21. cases are recorded in Table X.
The prisoners, as a rule, improve in health during their stay in Gaol, and some are hardly recog nizable on their departure as the miserable wretches they were when they came in. A good deal of trouble is caused by the numbers who come in suffering from itch or swarming with lice, many of them so filthy as to have large sores in their heads from this cause. I have somewhere seen it said that Chinese do not suffer so much from corns as Europeans, on account of the peculiar make of their shoes, but that statement is not at all borne out by many of those received in the Gaol. They are not troubled, as a rule, much with corns on the side of the foot, but the peculiarity of their shoes seems to be to create corns on all the knuckles of the toes, and a good many suffer from bunions.
The opium smokers have been treated as heretofore, that is to say, their habit entirely ignored, and I have had no trouble with them at all. A Chinese merchant was one day lamenting that his son gave him much trouble owing to his giving way to this vice. I recommended him to send him to Gaol for debt and I would undertake his cure. The only trouble in the opium smoker's case is his want of strength of will to give up the habit without he is compelled. I cannot find that its discon- tinuance produces any serious effects, the most annoying being the want of sleep for the first few nights; sometimes they complain of slight Diarrhoea, but it rarely requires any treatment.
There were four executions. In no case was the neck dislocated, neither was there any struggle; the shock of the fall caused insensibility, and strangulation completed the execution; the drop is now a full six feet,
Somew industries have been introduced into the Gaol, and very good and strong grass matting is now made by the prisoners, as well as capital coir mats and matting, for which orders are gladly received.
The solitary cells do their work well, and it is a rare event to see the punishment cells all full. Very few floggings have taken place this year; the cane on the breech seems to have made a great im- pression; its marks once made are never got rid of, but the men can now show their backs without advertising to the world that they have been Gaol-birds.
Altogether, the health of the Gaol has been very good; the greater part of the cases taken into the Hospital are men who were suffering from disease on their arrival in the Gaol.
TEMPORARY LUNATIC ASYLUM.
This is at present at an old house in the Hollywood Road which is fast becoming uninhabitable. I have heard nothing about the intended new Lunatic Asylum, although the money for it was voted long ago and the site chosen.
Six lunatics were admitted this year; one of them still remains in the Asylum, one was discharged cured, two were relieved and two sent home.
TUNG WAH HOSPITAL.
The total number of cases admitted into this Hospital was 1,470; of these 796 died, most of the admittances being moribund cases or incurables; 77,467 out-patients were treated.
Into the Small Pox Wards 128 cases were admitted, of whom 73 died, but it must be remembered that the majority of these cases were infants under two yeurs of age.
The number of vaccinations performed by the native Doctors belonging to this Hospital in the city of Victoria and in the villages and rural districts of Hongkong, was 1,769.
LOCK HOSPITAL.
There were more admissions into this Hospital this year,-129 as compared with 105 in 1878, but the average number of days' detention was considerably less, being 13.6 as compared with 19.0 in 1878, showing that the cases were of a milder type. See Table XV 4.
One Chinese unregistered woman petitioned for admission, suffering from extensive and numerous sores on the body and limbs, and having lost a portion of the soft palate from ulceration; she has been in the Hospital some six months.
The total number of examinations made was 10,991.
Only one case of Secondary Syphilis has occurred this year among the registered women.
To the Military Hospital 183 men were admitted suffering from venereal disease as compared with 188 last year; of these 14 were cases of Secondary Syphilis, 7 of which were contracted in Hong- kong, exactly the same number as was recorded in 1878.
To the Naval Hospital 293 were admitted suffering from venereal disease; of these 67 cases were not contracted in Hongkong. In 1878 only 221 were admitted, of which 57 were not contracted in Hongkong. The number of cases of Secondary Syphilis was 39, of which 16 were contracted in Hong- kong. Last year the admissions for this cause were 35, of which 11 cases were contracted in Hongkong.
So that there has been a slight increase of disease among the Naval Seamen, the number of cases among the Military remaining much the same.
Among the Police there were thirty-two cases admitted to Hospital as compared with forty-one in 1878; and three cases of Secondary Syphilis as compared with two in 1878.
Forty-two cases of venereal were admitted to the Civil Hospital as compared with ninety-eight in 1878; of the forty-two, twenty-four were not contracted in Hongkong, and of the ninety-eight, thirty- seven were not contracted in Hongkong.
The trouble is with the women of the boat population, and it is from these that most of the soldiers and sailors contract diseuse.
HEALTH OF THE COLONY.
Table XVI shows the rate of mortality among the European residents for the last ten years, and it will be seen that only one year in the ten bears comparison, as regards mortality, with 1879; 55 deaths occurred this year as compared with 49 in 1873; the next nearest year is 1875, when the number of deaths was 59.
Table XVII shows the work done by the Inspectors of Nuisances. The fines amounted to $619.15 as compared with $2,111.83 in 1878; the number of notices issued, 6,000 as compared with 10,000 in 1878.
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