Heilbrigðisskýrslur - 01.12.1955, Blaðsíða 226
1955
— 224 —
The maternity death rate 1955 was
0.2 per 1000 children born. The di-
stribution of maternal deaths is
shown on p. 83.
13. Artificial Abortion (cf. table
XII).
During the year 29 artificial abor-
tions took place under the Birth Con-
trol Act, which came into operation
in 1935. In 10 out of these 29 cases
social as well as medical indications
had been taken into consideration.
14. Accidents. The figure of deaths
by accidents (including suicide) is
0.58 per 1000 of the whole popula-
tion.
1951 1952 1953 1954 1955
Deaths by Suicide 18 17 12 19 23
Deaths by
other Violence 92 71 90 70 68
The distribution of deaths by acci-
dents is shown on pp. 84—86.
15. Care of Infants may be said to
be fairly good, the great majority of
the children being breast-fed. The
midwives have made out a report
(table XIII) concerning 4456 infants
born during the year. Reports on the
nutrition of infants were submitted
in 4300 cases which accordingly were
grouped as follows (Reykjavík figures
in brackets):
Breast-fed ....... 92.0 p.c. (98.5 p.c.)
Breast-
and bottle-fed 5.1 — (0.5 — )
Bottle-fed only . 2.9 — ( 1.0 — )
16. Health Officials and Auxiliary
Personnel (cf. table I). The total num-
ber of licensed medical men in Iceland
was 204 in 1955. There are 53 medical
districts. The number of midwives
holding appointments is 144 while
the number of districts is about 200.
Trained nurses do little service out-
side hospitals and institutions. Den-
tists are very few (35 in the whole
country). Trained dispensing chemists
are only in the larger towns, in vil-
lages and in the country the district
medical officers have a small drug
store.
17. General Insurance. The National
Insurance Act of 1936 (amended
several times) covers besides disea-
ses: accident, disablement and old
age insurance, sickness insurance
being obligatory for the whole coun-
try since 1 October 1951.
At the end of the year 95153 per-
sons were registered insured under
the National Insurance Act, organi-
zed in 225 sickness-benefit societies,
children under 16 years being insured
with their parents or foster-parents.
18. Food and Nutrition. Public in-
spection of food has taken place in
this country since 1936, when the
Food Adulteration Act came into
force. This Act provides for com-
prehensive control of all articles of
food and other nutritients. This in-
spection is in the hands of the di-
strict medical officers of health and the
sanitary committees, in co-operation
with the local police authorities. The
chemical analysis work is done at the
public Chemical Analysis Institute in
Reykjavík; 32 samples of food (milk
and milk products excepted) were
submitted for analysis in 1955, out of
which number 13 were found to be
not up to the standards (40.6 per
cent).
19. Hospitals, large and small, in
1955 numbered 49 in the whole coun-
try, with 1615 beds, or 10.4 beds per
1000 inhabitants, 43 of this number
being general hospitals, with 1029 beds
(6.6 per 1000). In the tuberculosis
sanatoria there are 257 beds (about
1.6 per 1000). Of other special ho-
spitals may be mentioned: 1 lunatic
asylum, 1 leprosarium and 1 small
epidemic hospital in Reykjavík. The
hospitalization days in all hospitals
amounted to 3.3 per head for the
whole population: in the general ho-
spitals the figure was 2.1 and in the
sanatoria 0.44 (cf. also tables XVII—
XVIII).