Abstract
WHEN a great public work is being done, it is a duty to call attention to it. In March 1862, Prof Longmore, of Netley, who had acted as Sanitary Officer during the Mutiny at Calcutta, gave the following evidence before the Royal Commission on the sanitary state of the Indian Army:—“As regards the chief part of this extensive city (Calcutta)—that inhabited by the native population—the pestilential condition of the surface-drains and yards, and many of the tanks among the huts and houses, would not be credited by any one who had not been among them.” In the “Report on Sanitary Improvements in India up to June 1871,” recently printed by the India Office, is given a table showing that the cholera mortality in Calcutta had, for twenty years preceding 1861, averaged nearly 5,000 deaths per annum. In 1860 the cholera deaths were 6,553, atld in 1866 they were 6,823. About this latter date works of drainage and water supply were commenced and have been gradually extended. Water is taken from the Hooghly and thoroughly filtered—it is then conveyed in pipes 123/4 miles in length to a reservoir in Calcutta and thence distributed. The whole population had this benefit conferred on them in the beginning of 1870, from which date the use of foul tank and river water was discontinued.
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Results of Sanitary Improvement in Calcutta . Nature 5, 150 (1871). https://doi.org/10.1038/005150a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/005150a0