| Disease and Industry. | Cases. | Deaths. | ||
| Year ended December. | Year ended December. | |||
| 1908 | 1903 | 1908 | 1903 | |
| Lead Poisoning | ||||
| Smelting of Metals | 70 | 37 | 2 | 2 |
| Brass Works | 6 | 15 | ||
| Sheet Lead and Lead Piping | 14 | 11 | ||
| Plumbing and Soldering | 27 | 26 | ||
| Printing | 30 | 13 | 2 | 2 |
| File Cutting | 9 | 24 | 2 | 2 |
| Tinning and Enamelling of Iron Hollow-ware | 10 | 14 | 0 | |
| White Lead Works | 79 | 109 | 3 | 2 |
| Red and Yellow Lead Works | 12 | 6 | 0 | |
| China and Earthenware | 117 | 97 | 12 | 3 |
| Litho-transfer Works | 2 | 3 | 0 | |
| Glass Cutting and Polishing | 3 | 4 | 1 | |
| Enamelling of Iron Plates | 7 | 4 | 0 | |
| Electrical Accumulator Works | 25 | 28 | 1 | |
| Paint and Colour Works | 25 | 39 | 0 | 1 |
| Coach Making | 70 | 74 | 3 | 5 |
| Shipbuilding | 15 | 24 | 1 | |
| Paint used in other Industries | 47 | 46 | 1 | 1 |
| Other Industries | 78 | 40 | 5 | |
| Total Lead Poisoning | 646 | 614 | 32 | 19 |
| Mercurial Poisoning | 10 | 8 | ||
| Phosphorus Poisoning | 1 | |||
| Arsenic Poisoning | 23 | 5 | 1 | |
| Anthrax | 47 | 47 | 7 | 11 |
| Total Factories and Workshops | 727 | 674 | 40 | 30 |
| Lead Poisoning amongst House Painters and Plumbers | 239 | 201 | 44 | 39 |
| Grand Total | 966 | 875 | 84 | 69 |
The greater part of the table, it will be seen, refers to factories and workshops, but a line is added to show the cases of lead poisoning amongst house painters.
Thus, in 1908, 84 workpeople, and in 1903, 69 workpeople, succumbed to poisoning or anthrax, while about 966 non-fatal cases were reported in the later year. Hundreds more, of course, go unreported, but the figures as they stand, representing only part of the terrible truth, make one shudder.
Most of the lead poisoning cases under china and earthenware refer to women and young girls, and it should be noted that the figures for 1903 are very much better than those of previous years. Prior to 1899 one in every fifteen of the persons employed in lead processes was reported as suffering from plumbism! Stringent new rules were made in 1898, a monthly medical examination being provided for, and in 1899 the reported cases fell from 457 to 249. Now they have fallen, as our table shows, to about 100 per annum. That is bad enough, for only some 6,000 pottery workers are employed in the lead processes. The improvement, however, shows how much can be done to protect the factory worker. Pity it is that such steps were not taken before the people of the Potteries were stunted by their deadly employment.
The horrible disease, anthrax, is responsible for about ten deaths per annum, and as its bacillus lurks in wool, hair, hides and skins imported from many countries for many industries, a large number of workers, from warehousemen to woolcombers, regularly run the risk of contagion.
Turning to mining, the public is reminded at intervals, by a large scale disaster, of the work of the coal-miner. Momentarily, we think of the perilous nature of the industry upon which our wealth is built, and then the tide of events sweeps on—and we forget.
Who remembers the last Rhondda holocaust? Was it in 1904 or in 1906? How many men perished? What was the cause? Few could answer these questions. Perhaps the 1910 disaster at Whitehaven will be more easily remembered because of its picturesque horror; because the sea washes over the miners' tomb; because reluctant hands were compelled to build a wall between the dead and the living. But these things are but the scenery of tragedy. It is the deaths that matter, and Whitehaven, awful as it is, accounts for but about one-ninth or one-tenth of the deaths in or about coal-mines of which the year 1910 will take toll.[31]
There will be the usual inquiry in the matter of this disaster, and I assume that the gravest consideration will be given to the circumstances. It appears to have been forgotten that on November 26th, 1907, five men were killed and seven injured at this same Whitehaven Colliery under circumstances which involved breaches of the Coal-Mines Regulation Act, and that on that occasion nearly 200 miners were imperilled. The cause was careless shot-firing, the same cause which destroyed 120 miners in the Rhondda in 1905—and in his official report Mr R. A. S. Redmayne said:—
"Had the flame reached the haulage road, the loss of life would have been very great, as probably all the morning shift, amounting to 180 persons ... would have lost their lives."
Thus there was very grave and recent warning as to the need for care in this fiery mine underneath the sea.