Infantile paralysis in Massachusetts in 1909.

  • Massachusetts. State Board of Health.
Date:
[1910]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Infantile paralysis in Massachusetts in 1909. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    o* N> FT m a zt o r. o a 4-> o oo C/3 3 H-'1 ^o c ac J 3 crc zl —] a o n <-♦ © 3 3 CD C/3 ^ ? c 3 o O t — p u n 3 5 o « S' b22431974 TRACTS 1623(11) c <U c 11 It seemed to us better to confine the investigation to certain localities, making it exhaustive in certain affected districts in the neighborhood of Boston, rather than to take up a scattered investigation throughout the State. Up to this time the expense of the inquiry had been borne by the Board out of its regular appropriation, but in January, 1910, the Board asked the Legislature for a special appropriation of $5,000 to enable the Board to make a proper and adequate inquiry into this disease as it occurred in the State in 1910. This sum of money was voted without question or opposition. It is our purpose to have on hand a sufficient number of investigators during the coming summer to be able to look into the surroundings of every case within forty-eight hours of the time when the case is reported. In presenting for the Board some of the results obtained in 1909, it is only proper to say that in the present state of our knowledge no one can say which data are relevant and important and which are not. It is possible that certain facts which now seem of no importance may be of assistance to some future investigator. So far as practicable, our data are presented in graphic form. There are three classes of cases dealt with in this report: (a) the total number reported (923) ; (5) the num- ber in which blanks were filled out (628) ; (c) the number thoroughly studied (150). All three classes are utilized in different tables, some being available for one purpose and some for another. Distribution in the State. A consideration of the distribution of the disease in the State of Massa- chusetts for the past three years shows that in all three years the disease {occurred in scattered foci in all parts of the State, hut was more fre- quent in the river valleys than away from rivers; that a case rarely occurred in a town without one or more cases in contiguous towns, and I that localities severely affected one year were lightly affected the next; e.g., the outbreak in the upper Connecticut valley in 1908 was followed by very few cases in 1909 in that region. In the next year but one, how- ever, localities markedly affected may again show many cases; e.g., in 1907 the extreme western end of the State showed many cases, in 1908 almost none, and in 1909 again man}7 cases. The metropolitan district shows, of course, a large number of cases, and it will be noted that in general there were more cases of the disease in the towns north of Bos- ton than in towns south of it.