REPORT
ON
PLAGUE IN THE PUNJAB
FROM
OCTOBER 1ST, 1901, TO SEPTEMBER 30TH, 1902.
This report deals with the fifth season of plague in the Punjab, i.e., from October
1st, 1901, to September 30th, 1902.
A brief review of the epidemic as a whole will first be given, after which the out-
breaks in each British district and in Native States will be separately described. The
description of the outbreaks in most British districts has been compiled from the reports
submitted by Deputy Commissioners and Plague Medical Officers; subjects are thus dealt
with both from the administrative and medical points of view. Separate reports by Civil
and Medical Officers were not received from Native States : in most instances reports
were submitted by Medical Officers. As the epidemic under report is the first that has
run its entire course, under conditions which left the decision as to the measures they
would adopt for their protection almost entirely to the people themselves, it has been
considered advisable to describe as fully as possible, without going into too minute detail,
the outbreak in each district or State, and to give the opinions and recommendations ex-
pressed by Civil and Medical Officers, with regard to measures for dealing with plague as
the result of their own experience.
2. During this year 267,581 cases of plague, with 174, 041 deaths, were reported
in the British districts of the Punjab, and 51,352 cases, with 46,348 deaths, in the Native
States, the total for the Province being 318,933 cases and 220,389 deaths. The epidemic
was the most severe and widespread that has hitherto occurred in the Punjab, both
cases and deaths exceeded by more than 20 times those of all the four previous
outbreaks put together. Outbreaks occurred in 16 British districts and 8 Native
States, while, except for a few imported cases, the disease had been previously limited to 8
British districts and 2 Native States.
These particulars will be better appreciated by a reference to the table (No. 1)
which is given on the opposite page, and to the two maps preceding it. In the table are
shown the number of plague cases and deaths which have been reported in the British
districts and Native States of the Punjab from the first appearance of the disease in
October 1897 to the end of September 1902.
It will be seen that in these five years the province has lost 2,29,621 of its inhabi-
tants from plague alone. Of the two maps just referred to, one shows the distribution of
plague in the Punjab from October 1897 to the end of September 1901, the other during
the year under report. In these maps infected areas and places are hatched in red, those in
which only imported cases of plague occurred are hatched in black..
Review of the epidemic,
3. The epidemic of 1900-01, although it died down during the hot weather,
did not entirely disappear, and there was no
period of complete freedom from plague, as
there had been towards the end of the hot weather in previous years.
October 1901.On October 1st, 1901, 4 districts-Jullundur, Hoshiarpur, Gurds-
pur and Silkot-were already infected, and by the end of the month plague had
broken out in the Shahpur and Ludhina Districts, and in the Native States of Patila and
Kapurthala.
In these 6 British districts and 2 Native States 3,393 plague cases and 1,448 deaths
occurred during the month.