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legislation to interfere with their independence. Emphatically the
editorial pointed out that people did not and could not understand the
truth of the stuation: in spite of the fine climate and the abundance
of good f.ood the mortality rate was greater in Hobart Town than it
ought to be and greater than it was elsewhere . In 'England if the
death rate exceeded 23 in each 1000 of the population, under the enactment
of the English Health Act the Central Board of Health was empowered to
appoint immediately commission to visit the spot investigate the cause
of what was considered to be an excessive amount of mortality initiate
a local Board of Health and take any other steps that were necessary to
improve the health of the place and reduce its mortality to the
ascertained mean standar d.
Moreover in England the Registrar-General
had shown that the mean annual rat.e of mortality for the ten years ending
December 31 1854, was 2,284 per 100000, or less than 23 in the 1,000 .
In 1855 it was only 2,269 out of every 100000.
Comparing the death rate
in Hobart Town, the Daily News declared that, in 1855, the numb er of
deaths were 775 out of a population of 26095;
therefore, the mortality
rate \'las within a trifle of 30 in the 1,000 or above 25% more than what
was estimated as an excessive mortality for ngland.
In the years
previous to 1855, it had been even igher - in 1852, 864 deaths,
a truly alarming situation;
deaths were preventab le.
in 1853, 1,073
in 1854, 937
at least one third to one half of these
Do not such facts, even in a commercial point of view, the
lowest of all render it imperative upon us to put into
operation the various provisions of the English Health Act
without ',a day's delay. Yet with such wholesale and costly
destruction as this annually of our popu lation our supine
Government stirs not . It is indeed prodigal of treasure
to introduce immigrants, but is innocent of the most trifling
expenditure to preserve the more valuab le population we
already possess.
With the appalling health situation in Hobart Town statistically
estab lished beyond dispute, the Daily News in its second editorial in the
series on July 9, discussed the causes of the excessive mortality
concentrating firstly on impure air.
In accordance with the commonly
accepted theory of the time that air fouled by the nauseous gases of
decomposing organic matter was the basic cause of disease it made a
· scathing attack on the filthy state of the city.
Already this young city rivals in these respects the worst
examples recorded in the pub lished documents of the English
Sanitary Commissions .