A supplementary report on the results of a special inquiry into the practice of interment in towns.

by Edwin Chadwick

	Number of deaths of each class.			Number of deaths from Epidemic disease.	Average age at death of all who die above 21.	Average age at death of the whole class, including children.
	Adults.	Children under 10 years.	Total.
Gentlemen	49	19	68	2	65	45
Farmers, &c.	205	45	250	14	60	47
Labourers	833	324	1157	87	58	39
Paupers	26	11	37	1	71	51
Undescribed	124	143	267	19	68	30
Totals	1237	512	1779	123	60	39

The total number of births registered in the several districts in the metropolis, where it is yet far from complete, in the year 1839, was 51,232, or 1 to 37 of the population. The total number of births registered in Hereford during the same year was 2579, or 1 to 44.

The positions advanced in the Sanitary Report of the greater proportion of births in the districts where the deaths are the most frequent, is confirmed in respect to the metropolis by a more recent return with which I have been obligingly favoured by the Registrar-General, in which he shows,—

	Proportion per cent.		Ratio of deaths to births.
	Deaths.	Births.
“Unhealthiest sub-districts	3·14	3·66	1 to 1·17
Less unhealthy sub-districts	2·68	3·18	1 to 1·19
Average sub-districts	2·43	3·35	1 to 1·38
Healthier sub-districts	2·17	2·64	1 to 1·22
Healthiest sub-districts”	1·87	2·47	1 to 1·32
“The mortality is 68 per cent. higher in the unhealthy than in the healthy sub-districts: the proportion of births is 48 per cent. greater in the unhealthy than in the healthy sub-districts.”

If the deaths in the metropolis during 1839 had been in the same proportion to the population as they were in Hereford, there would have been 8866 funerals less during that year.

If the proportion of births in the metropolis during that year had been the same as in Hereford, there would have been 16,053 births the less.

Or to vary the illustration:—

If the deaths in Hereford had been in the same proportion as the deaths in the metropolis, the community in that county would during that year have had 977 funerals the more.

If the births in Hereford had been in the same proportion as in the metropolis, there would during that year have been 540 births the more.

If the deaths in the whole of England and Wales had been in the proportions attained in some districts, and attainable in all, namely, 1 in 50, there would during the year have been 31,866 funerals less, and more than ten times that amount of cases of sickness the less.