98
HONG KONG ANNUAL REPORT
under 5. The increasing tendency for this disease to occur amongst young children appears to have been checked. The following table illustrates the trend over the past six years.
1950 1951
1952
1953
1954
1955
(under 5
24
92
94
299
250
205
Cases
over 5
234
282
242
363
285
319
% of total under 5 .......
9.3
24.6
28
45.2
46.7
39.1
under 5
13
12
16
27
19
Deaths
over 5......
11
16
10
10
10
18
% of total under 5........
26.7
44.8
54.5
61.5
73
51.4
Diphtheria. The incidence of this disease has roughly doubled each year from 1947 to 1954. This year there has been a marked drop in notifications. Immunization was carried out throughout the year, and was intensified during the annual anti-diphtheria campaign, which was held a little earlier than usual this year, in the months immediately preceding the normal peak period of incidence. Propaganda in favour of immunization was conducted in all schools and curative and infant welfare clinics, by loud hailers mounted on mobile vans touring the streets, and by posters. The response, though not as great as had been hoped, was satisfactory.
Enteric fever, which threatened to produce an epidemic in 1953, and was still dangerously prevalent in 1954, has shown a dramatic drop in incidence. These are the lowest figures on record since 1950 as regards notifications, and the fewest number of deaths since 1946. Of special interest was the absence of any peak in the incidence during the summer, the first year on record in which there has been no such increase. This deviation from the usual trend of the disease indicates a definite improvement in the typhoid situation. A number of factors contributed to reduce incidence of the disease
(a) Prophylactic measures, which included an extensive T.A.B. inoculation campaign, the regular super- vision of eating establishments, and the education of their employees in food-handling, by personnel of
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