Sessional_Paper_1904 — Page 205

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The high proportion of cases in Chinese female infants is probably to be accounted for by the fact that a female infant is not so valuable as a male and hence so much trouble is not taken to prevent the illness being brought to the notice of the authorities. By far the majority of the infants left at the convents are females and consequently cases of Plague amongst such do not escape notifica- tion.

It is interesting to note that the next worst age period for females is from 5-15 years the age in which are mostly found the servant girls in Chinese families. The information acquired from the occupiers of a Plague house--when any inform- tion at all can be obtained-is generally to the effect that such young girls are of no occupation. It is however highly probable that as a class these servant girls are more often attacked than others. Such girls would generally be not so well fed or cared for as the other members of the family and would have in many cases to sleep on the floor or in an out-of-the-way corner of the room. In such a way they night become exposed to infection through rats and other vermin.

It has been formerly put forward as an explanation of the high case rate in Chinese women that they are more in the houses than the men and hence inore exposed to infection.

With

The figures of the Tables I have given do not seem to bear this out. the exception of the age period 5-15 there is no special high rate for females, al- though women above the age of 15 naturally keep more indoors than do female children. In fact from 25-60 years the women have a lower rate than the men in proportion to their numbers in the Colony.

Dumping Bodies.

There have been this year 433 bodies found in the streets or on the hillsides. Some of these may have been the bodies of persons who have died in the streets, etc., either while trying to go about their usual business or who have been turned out of doors by their companions while sick and dying. A great many of such bodies are undoubtedly removed from houses at night and dumped in the streets to avoid the disinfection and disturbance which follows the discovery of a Plague case in a house.

The percentage of bodies thus found in the streets this year is 31 7 per cent. A great many houses, therefore, which ought to be disinfected escape this precaution, and of course the undoubtedly infected clothing and the personal effects of the dead person made use of straight away by other people may be a ready means of spreading the disease. The percentages of bodies thus found in the streets and hillsides, etc., for the past six years are as follows:-

Year

1898,...Percentage of bodies found,.....23-1

1899,

"

$1

1900,

1901,

,

1902,

"

1903,

77

99

91

""

"1

...24.2

...29.5

...19.7

...34.6

.....31-7

Plague amongst Rats.

During the whole of the epidemic a systematic collection of rats has been nade throughout the City and British Kowloon. These rats have been bacter- iologically examined at the Public Mortuary. The result of this enquiry reduced to the form of a curve is given in the following diagram.

The upper curve indicates the weekly rise and fall in the percentage of infected rats while the lower curve gives the weekly number of Plague cases.

It will be noticed that both curves rise to their highest points about the same time.

Looked at closely it will be noticed that the first notable rise in the rat infection at the 6th and 7th weeks is accompanied by a sudden rise of human Plague in the 6th week followed by a sudden fall again in the 7th week. The next rise of note in the rat Plague in the 9th and 10th weeks is accompanied by a continuous rise in human Plague from the 9th to the 11th weeks, and again the rise in rat Plague in the 12th and 13th weeks is accompanied in the 12th and 13th weeks by a high rise in the human Plague curve and followed by a great rise in the 14th week.