Chinese and 8 Europeans, the latter all being military personnel and their families, with the exception of one case in an infant, reported by the Navy.
45. Poliomyelitis has been notifiable as an infectious disease since July 1948, the first full year for statistical purposes being 1949. Only paralytic cases are usually notified and all figures given are for such cases, with the exception of 7 cases in 1954 which were non-paralytic. No virus laboratory is available nearer than Singapore, and few serological tests to confirm diagnoses have been made. Infection chiefly affecta two quite specífic groups, namely,
(a) infants and young children both Chinese and Non-
Chinese; and
(b) young Non-Chinese adults, particularly those who have
recently arrived in the Colony.
The first group (under 5 years of age) have accounted for 54% of all cases notified from 1949 to 1966. The majority have been Chinese but it is to be noted that the ratio of Chinese to Non-Chinese in the population is approximately 100 to 1. The second group of young European adults appears to be especially at risk within the first year or so of arrival, and a large number of the cases occurring in this group have been among British servicemen and their families. Visiting United States Navy personnel have also been affected. The disease is also more fatal in this group, with a tendency to a rapidly ascending There paralysis causing death within one or two days of onset. appears to be no real sex difference in the infantile group. The young adult group naturally shows more males affected since the servicemen at risk are predominantly male. As regards season of the year, cases have occurred at random throughout the whole year with the exception of 1955 when 26 cases were reported in June. There has been no apparent association between the incidence of cases and immunological procedures- particularly anti-diphtheria inoculations--though several hundred thousands of these injections have been given to children under 10 years of age since 1952. An investigation into the titre of antibodies to this disease circulated in the blood of various categories of the population is being made with the cooperation of Professor Hale of the University of Malaya, who visited the Colony to assist in planning the work.
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46.
Scarlet fever returns showed a considerable drop; only
14 cases were registered as compared with 45 in the preceding year. They were all under 15 years of age, 6 of them Europeans, and & Chinese.
Vaccination and Inoculation Campaigns.
47. The anti-smallpox campaign launched in December 1955 remained in full operation until March 9th, 1956 and was almost immediately followed by the annual anti-typhoid inoculation campaign which lasted until June. The anti-diphtheria inocula- tion programme ran for a period of 2 months from September to November and on December 10th another anti-smallpox campaign was launched, which ended on March 15th, 1957. In between these campaigns, mobile teams continued to operate in various places in the New Territories, the resettlement and squatter areas and amongst the floating population. 619 requests for prophylactic vaccination teams from various Government Departments, factories and other institutions were dealt with during the year. Two vans fitted with loud hailers, which had been donated to Government some years previously, rendered valuable services in disseminating health propaganda and were most useful in drawing crowds to the mobile stations. They also followed up the work of the mobile teams in overcrowded places especially in the resettlement and squatter areas. Figures showing numbers of prophylactic immunizations carried out during 1956 are shown in Appendix 3.
Port Health.
48. The Port Health Administration is responsible for the prevention of the importation of infectious diseases into the Colony by sea, land, and air, for the sanitary control of the port area and airport; for the carrying out of the provisions of the International Sanitary Regulations as embodied in the Quaran- tine and Prevention of Diseases Ordinance; for the compilation of epidemiological statistics and reports, and for rendering assistance in prophylactic vaccination campaigns.
19. Passengers and crews of incoming vessels were inspected at the two Quarantine Anchorages in Kowloon Bay and Stone- cutters Island respectively; arrivals by air were inspected at Kai Tak Airport, and persons entering by the land frontier were checked at Lo Wu Station Quarantine Post. In the absence of
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