X1000306-1974-75_Part01 — Page 5

The following is a summary of the significant events and developments which occurred in 1974–75.

General

I.

VITAL STATISTICS

Public Records Offten of Hong Kong Reference Library

Ref. No.

Acc. No.

4629

Date 19 APR 1977

The estimated population of Hong Kong in the middle of 1974 vas 4,248,700. About 33 per cent were under 15, and 8 per cent over 60 years of age. The general state of health was favourable and reflected the rapid development of medical and health services.

Birth Rate

The crude birth rate was 19.3 per thousand population, the same as the rate for 1973.

Neo-natal and infant mortality rates

These rates remained low and were shown in Figure 1. The infant mortality rate was 17.4 per thousand live births and is now at a lower level than many European and American countries. This decline was due to the improvement in environmental conditions, development of maternal and child health services and increasing public appreciation of the value of these services. The major causes of infant deaths were due to congenital anomalies, immaturity, pneumonia and anoxic and hypoxic conditions.

Maternal Mortality

The rate for 1974 was 0.16 per thousand total births, compared with 0.10 in the previous year. The main causes of maternal mortality were haemorrhages, abortions, ectopic pregnancies and toxaemia.

General mortality

The crude death rate was 5.2 per thousand population. As shown in Figure 2, age and sex specific death rates were also low.

On the whole, malignant neoplasms were the main cause of death being responsible for 21.2 per cent of all deaths in 1974. The death rate from cancer continued to increase, rising from 43.9 per 100,000 population for both sexes in 1954 to 83.2 in 1964 and to 110.2 in 1974. The common cancers were cancers of the lung, liver, nasopharnyx and the stomach.

The

The second leading cause of death was heart diseases, followed by pneumonia, cerebro-vascular diseases, accidents and tuberculosis. respective rates and percentages are shown in Tables 13-15.