ENG-1960 — Page 159

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HEALTH

Trends in the actual incidence of various diseases are more difficult to evaluate. Expansion of both in-patient and out-patient facilities, scientific advances in diagnosis and treatment, and the ever-widening application of the principles of preventive medicine and environmental hygiene are factors which prevent comparison from year to year of such morbidity statistics as are available. However, there have been clear increases in the diseases of later life, corresponding to the gradual aging of the population, and in accidents both inside and outside the home. The high birth rate, producing approximately 100,000 new susceptible persons each year in an overcrowded environment, militates against any marked decline in the incidence of most infectious diseases, although there are signs that control measures against tuberculosis are beginning to take effect, particularly among children.

Vital Statistics. Accurate details of the size and structure of the population will only be known after the Colony Census has been held in March 1961. However, pilot censuses held during 1960 have supported presumptions from previous surveys that over one-third of the population is below the age of 15, that only 5% are aged 60 or over, and that there is a preponderance of males amongst young adults and those of middle age.

After a slight decline during the previous year, the number of live births registered in 1960 continued the marked upward bent of the last decade, although the rate remained comparatively constant at 37.1 per 1,000 estimated population. The crude death rate declined further to 6.4 per 1,000 estimated population. The resulting natural increase of 191,521 persons is the highest ever recorded in Hong Kong.

Both infant mortality and maternal mortality rates have dropped to half of the rates recorded a decade ago, while neonatal mor- tality has also declined, although by no means to the same extent. The marked fall in these three mortality rates has been achieved in spite of the rapidly increasing number of births and in the case of the child mortality rates can be attributed to a great decrease in deaths from infections and other febrile conditions. The fall in the maternal mortality rate has been brought about by reduc- tions in the incidence of death from toxaemias and haemorrhages of pregnancy, while deaths from septic complications of pregnancy and childbirth have remained satisfactorily low.