Heilbrigðisskýrslur - 01.12.1927, Side 89

87
undcr i year or persons above 65 years caught the disease. Sometimes
this usually benign disease was bad enough (high feber, severe pain),
but there were also many abortive cases. — Of acute intesitinal
catarrh 2158 cases were notified (1303 in 1926) but evidently many
of them were a very mild form of paradysentery (Sonne) as pro-
ved by the bacteriological laboratory of the University. As in many cases
no blood was found in the stools the physicians labelled the diseasé as
an intestinal catarrh and only 15 cases were reported á's paradysentery.
Parodysentery may be considered an indigenous disease in Iceland as
some cases are yearly reported and sometimes there have been wide spread
outbreaks, the last one in 1911—12. That time it had an epidemic car-
achter and spread through a great part of the country. Very likely it is
sometimes mixed up with simple intestinal catarrh as really was the case
ihis year. The differential diagnosis may be difficult.
b) Epidemic diseases imiported from abroad. ■— Of.
ní e a s 1 e s only 2 cases are mentioned loiterers from the epidemic in
1926. — Of German measles 52 cases are mentioned, remnants
from the epidemic in 1925—26. — Whooping cough having been
imported from Denmark in Oct. the previous year, ran 011927 as a wide
spread epidemic through the country, 6645 cases being notified and 155
deaths (96 in the first year, 53 in 1—4 year registered). As maý be seen
from the table p. 48 (age incidence), many fullgrown people and söme
over 65 years caught the disease. One of them was a woman 83 years
old (died). Not a few of the fullgrown people caught the disease for a
second time. In old people it is often of a mild irregular type and not.
always recognized as such. Such persons often spread the diseasei In
spite of the great susceptibility of young people to catch the disease many
children seem to be practically immune. In one instance the physician
estimates that y of the exposed children (playmates of diseased child-
ren) did not catch the disease. Isolation of patients or their homes has
often been tried in Iceland as a preventive measure in whooping cough epi-
demics, but usually without success. This time some pliysicians succeded by
such preventive measures in keeping their districts partially or totally free
írom the epidemic. Preventive vaccination against the disease was tried by
several physicians, apparently with gcod result, as far as can be seen
from the scanty reports. So of 158 vaccinated cbildren 73,4% did not
catch the disease, 21,5% caught it in a mild form and only 5,1% were
much affected. Several newer medicines were given a trial e. g. Neopan-
earpine without any success. — Of influenza there was no typical
outbreak, but never the less about 2000 cases were notified. The seasonal-
and age incidence points perhaps to some mixing up of influenza and re-
spiratory catarrh, the differential diagnosis of two diseases being very
difficuit, sometimes impossible. In some districts the physicians describe
the disease as a typical influenza, in cthers as a respiratory catarrh and
in 18 districts of 48 no patients are notified. — Of acute poli o-m y e-
I i t i s 12 cases were reported in 5 districts. Since the great epidemic in
1924 the disease seems to have got a foothold in the ccuntry. — Of e n-
cephalitis lethargica 17 cases were notified, 16 of them in