“There must be something very wrong in the condition of the people when we find that out of all children born about one-fifth die before they are one year old, and one-third before they are five.”
In the north part of his district in the quarter ended December 28, 1872, the rate of mortality of children under five was 61·1 per cent., whilst in the quarter ended September, 1873, in Goodman’s Fields the rate was 72·4 per cent.
In St. George-the-Martyr, Southwark, in 1873–4, of 1,256 deaths 694 (= 55·3 per cent.) were under five.
In the same year the Medical Officer of Health for Paddington wrote:—
“In taking fifteen streets typical of the ordinary condition of the dwellings in which the working-class reside, I find the annual proportion of deaths under five ranges from 41 to 75 per cent. of the total deaths….
“The deaths from all causes in eighteen such streets varies from 21·7 to 50 per 1,000.”
The Medical Officer of Health for Limehouse wrote in 1874:—
“As usual we find that of 1,000 deaths more than 500 are those of children under five.”
Two years later it was 53 per cent.
Nor was it only in the central parts of London that the infantile mortality was so frightful. In Wandsworth, the mean annual rate during the years 1865–74 was 49·6 per cent.