4 ANNUAL REPORT ON THE

* Vide Report for 1876,
page 15, para 22.

   The mean annual average of treated in Military Lock Hospitals from 1873 to
1877 inclusive is 1599.2. The number under treatment in 1877 amounted to
2,205 or to 605.8 above the average for the quinquennium. In the civil institutions
the mean average of treated during the five years amounts to 1341.6, while the
admissions for the year under report aggregate 2,042, being an excess over the
average of 700.6. The increase in the numbers of treated in Military Lock
Hospitals appears to have been due largely to the pressure of the famine, under
which numbers of starving women, many of them seriously diseased, flocked into
and practised prostitution in several of the large cantonments and towns. The
returns for civil institutions are not complete, but so far as the Presidency town is
concerned there is sufficient evidence to show that the numbers of prostitutes and
consequent prevalence of venereal diseases, were largely increased by the terrible
necessities of the famine. In one Native Regiment, quartered at Madras in the
neighbourhood of a large relief-camp, the admissions from venereal diseases were
so numerous as to attract attention, and the explanation given was that numbers
of starving women who had immigrated from the districts were practising
prostitution and that many of them were diseased. This fact corroborates what
has been stated in previous reports* to the effect that syphilis
is as wide-spread among the rural as among the urban
population of Southern India,

   4. Average Daily Sick and average Stay in Hospital.—In the Military Lock
Hospitals in 1877 the average daily sick numbered 146.50 and in the Civil
Hospitals 209.98. The averages of the past year were consequently in excess Of
those of the preceding years of the table. During the year under review the
average stay in Military Lock Hospitals was slightly more prolonged than in 1876,
though somewhat shorter than that for the remaining years of the quinquennium.
In Civil Hospitals the average stay of patients in 1877 was greater than in 1876 and
considerably in advance of the average stay in Military Lock Hospitals. The
longest residence in hospital is noted in connection with Rangoon and Madras, the
average in the former hospital being 38.30 and in the latter 37.55 days.

   5. Admissions and Cases of Primary Syphilis.—The admissions to Military
Lock Hospitals in 1877 were largely in excess of those of 1876 and of the
preceding years of the series as shown in the subjoined table :—

   It will be observed that the number of cases of primary syphilis among
the admissions in 1877 was proportionally greater than in 1876, the ratio per mille
for the two years being 292.99 and 275.74 respectively. This increase in the
number of cases of primary syphilis was doubtless the result of the crowding into
military cantonments from outlying districts of diseased women. These results,
however, do not necessarily lead to the conclusion that the famine converted respect-
able women into prostitutes ; that it did so, to a certain extent, there is some reason
to fear, but I am inclined to attribute the increase of prostitution within the sphere
of Lock Hospitals in 1877 principally to the emigration of village prostitutes to
the larger towns. The following table shows the admissions and the number as
well as the ratios per mille to total admissions of cases of primary syphilis in the
Civil Lock Hospitals from 1873 to 1877 inclusive :—