Second Annual Report of the Provincial Board of Health of Ontario, Being for the Year 1883 (Classic Reprint)

Download or read book Second Annual Report of the Provincial Board of Health of Ontario, Being for the Year 1883 (Classic Reprint) written by Provincial Board of Health of Ontario and published by . This book was released on 2015-08-05 with total page 500 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Excerpt from Second Annual Report of the Provincial Board of Health of Ontario, Being for the Year 1883 In this way, many of the lives yearly sacrificed to other filth diseases have been saved. It is here worthy of remark that, throughout our Province, as in most other countries, more deaths are caused yearly by the want of systems for securing thorough cleanliness of streets, lanes, and premises, good ventilation, effective drainage and ventilation of drains, good water supply, isolation of infected persons and careful disinfection than have ever been superadded to the ordinary mortality by any epidemic of cholera that has occurred. We would express the hope that Ontario will not be amongst the last to do away with this unsatisfactory state of affairs. Any person sufficiently interested in the saving of life, health and wealth, may obtain a fair idea of what may be gained by increased attention to sanitary organization and sanitary reforms generally, by calculating from the figures given in the "Statesman's Year Book," the ratio of deaths to population during the six years before the passage of the English Public Health Act of 1875 and during the six years following that date. He will find on adding the columns of population and deaths as given on page 243 of the volume for 1883, that for the first mentioned period the death rate was 22.09 per 1,000, and for the last mentioned, 20.63 per 1,000.Continuing his calculations, he will find the total saving thus effected in six years to amount to 219,118 lives. In England and Wales alone there were saved a number more than twice as great as the standing army of Great Britian for the same period. We would be horrified if the British army was destroyed by hostile armies every three years, and yet the people have been carelessly allowing to lurk in their midst invisible foes whose ravages have been no less destructive to life. And we may here remark that these figures are taken from one of the most accurate records in the world, and that they cover in each case a period of six years. We must also remember, that as years have rolled on, the population has been growing more dense. The Imperial Act of 1875 was the outcome of the formation of the Local Government Board of England, and one of its chief features is that provision is made for the establishment of a Board of Health in every municipal district, apart from the Boards of Aldermen and Councillors already in existence. It was expected that the formation of a Board in every municipality, whose sole duty it would be to care for the health of that municipality, and composed of men elected on account of their interest in sanitary matters, would be the means of saving many lives. How far this expectation has been realized the above figures have partially shown; but the saving, so far effected, will be enormously increased when the various schemes recently instituted for the stamping out of infectious diseases have been fully adopted, as they ultimately must be. People will not forever listen to erroneous nonsense about infringments of personal liberty and interference with business, whilst their children are being needlessly slaughtered by preventable disease. The people are now realizing more fully that life and money can be saved by more efficient sanitary organization. The remarks which have been made will apply with greater force to the Province on Ontario than they do to England. Many of the sanitary reforms and sanitary organizations which this Board desires to see introduced here had been in existence in many parts of England prior to the passing of the Act of 1875, to a far greater extent than is the case in this country, and it is the extension of them to every district, and the perfecting of the organizations referred to, that caused the saving of life before described. But let us for the present anticipate no more than that by the adoption of similar legislation similar results will follow. This means t