Public Health Statistics of India

Abstract

The annual report of the Public Health Commissioner to the Government of India for 1936, in two volumes, has recently been issued (Government of India Press, Now Delhi, 1938. Vol. 1, Rs. 2, or 3s. 6d.;vol. 2, Rs. 1, annas 10, or 2s. 9d). the stato of the public health of the civil population in British India is surveyed in vol. 1. the mid-year estimated population was 281,860,639–an increase of 3½ millions over 1935. the death-rate was 23, and the birth-rate 35, per 1,000, and the infantile death-rato per 1,000 live births was 162, compared with 164 for 1935. The deaths from cholera numbered 160,000, some 57,000 less than in the previous year, and those from plague wero only 13,000, less than half the figure for 1935; but the deaths from smallpox numbered 104,805 or 14,000 more than in the previous year. Deaths recorded under ‘fevers’ decreased by 4 per cent, but small percentage increases were recorded in respiratory diseases and the diarrhoea and dysentery group. Deaths recorded from hydrophobia numbered no fewer than 2,470. In vol. 2, the general health statistics of the British Army in India and of the Indian Army are considered. The general health of the troops seems to havo been well maintained, though admissions to hospital among the British were a little higher than in the previous year. The incidence of the enteric group of fevers is the lowest over recorded, and is particularly striking among the Indian troops. There has been no corresponding reduction among the civil population, but rather an increase. the decrease of enteric fevers in the Army must, it would seem, be ascribed to more general and better anti-typhoid vaccination, and to a more careful search for, and elimination of, carriers.