Sessional_Paper_1896 — Page 306

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Enclosure 2.

Report from the Medical Officer in charge of Gaol Hospital.

GAOL HOSPITAL, HONGKONG, 9th April, 1896.

SIR,I have the honour to forward the Annual Report for 1895 together with the following 'statistical tables.

Table IX. K. shows the number of prisoners admitted into Hospital and the diseases from which they were suffering; Table XIa. M. the cases that were admitted on first medical examination ; Table X. N. the cases that were treated without being received into the Hospital. The rate of sick- ness and mortality is given in Table XI. 0; the number and percentage of prisoners admitted on first medical examination, in Table XIb. L; that of opium smokers admitted into Hospital, in Table XI. P; the weight of opium smokers for the first four weeks' confinement in Table XI. Q. The record of this last table was, as usual, taken by the Hospital warders.

2. The admissions were much smaller than on the previous year. Although there were 5,014 prisoners in the Gaol, only 231 including 24 Europeans, were received into Hospital; while in 1894, there were 3,913 in the Gaol, and the admissions into Hospital attained to 271. A large proportion of these prisoners were suffering last year from fever and, as it was expected, from anæmia.

3. In an establishment like this, the number of patients alone, without reference to diseases and to places where they were contracted, cannot constitute a sure criterion for judging of its healthiness; because, as I have stated before, many prisoners on their admission were found sick or unable to undergo the punishments to which they had been sentenced.

4. It is chiefly with the Chinese prisoners and others who are kept in the same group, of fourteen days' sentences or under, that need be watched more closely. Their daily ration food consists of eighteen ounces of common rice with half an ounce of salt, to be divided into two meals, morning and evening. They have to pick daily 24 ounces of oakum or do some other light work. It is only on medical grounds that some of them get a little tea or congee or more food. I was told that the Gaol would be crowded, if the prisoners of the class were allowed a better dietetic scale.

5. The prisoners that were treated without being kept in the Hospital amounted to 983, com- prising 61 Europeans. Venereal and cutaneous diseases, boils and abscesses in different regions of the body, formed the greater percentage of those cases.

6. There were seven deaths amongst the Chinese prisoners from the following diseases:

■ Rupture of gall-bladder from obstruction of the bile duct, due to a malignant growth on the head of pancreas; Pneumonia of right lung, Pulmonary Phthisis; (Edema of both lungs; Pulmonary Congestion, and two deaths in consequence of Dysentery and general debility. One Chinaman, an old offender, committed suicide by hanging himself in his cell. Two Chinese were executed by order of the Supreme Court. One Indian, who belonged to the Asiatic Artillery and was sentenced to three years' hard labour for cutting and wounding, was released on medical recommendation, after having been eight months in Gaol. You will remember having examined him. He was suffering from anæmia and diarrhoea and, subsequently, from gangrenous stomatitis. He was in a very weak state and low spirits, but when he heard that he had been granted pardon, so powerful was the emotion, that it enabled him to stand up and walk, and his health improved remarkably in a few days.

7. The number of those that had received corporal punishment came up to 535. In this list are also included those that were flogged by order of the Supreme Court and of the Magistrate.

8. Amongst the prisoners that have been arrested or sentenced. I found that twelve Chinese male and one female were lepers. Almost all of them belonged to the neighbourhood of the mainland, and some had come to this Colony for treatinent, and had in their possession prescriptions from a well known European medical practitioner.

9. The subjoined table shows the number of the prisoners that have been vaccinated since vacci- nation was first started :--

Year.

Total number of vaccination

Failed at first vaccination

Taken.

and

re-vaccination.

and re-vaccination.

Total number of those who have been

vaccinated or inoculated outside the Gaol.

1888,

2,051

1,354

697

1,951

1889,

2,060

1,445

615

2,057

1890,

1,736

1,024

712

1,722

1891,

2,836

1,090

1,346

2,521

1892,

2,625

1,985

640

2,618

1893,

1,417

763

654

1,325

1894,

747

242

505

746

1895,

942

455

487

941