Mortality and Sickness in the City of Bristol for the Year 1903

The general death rate for the year 1903, uncorrected for sex and age distribution, is 14.22 per 1000 living, the lowest rate yet recorded for the city. While this is satisfactory, it is more important to note that the average rate for the past five years has not exceeded 17.1, a point at or below which, as suggested by Farr, the causal influence of general insanitary conditions upon the death rate apparently ceases, lower rates indicating a response to abnormally favourable conditions, such as, for ^example, the continued absence of extremes of heat or of cold, with their respective fatal influence upon the very young and the aged. The infant mortality rate, a delicate index to the sanitary balance of a population, is 116.3, lowest recorded rate in the