§ MR. BRAMSDON (Portsmouth)To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if he will state how many deaths occurred during the year 1907 in the metropolitan area, and in the other 58 part of England and Wales, respectively, from the effects of the administration of anæsthetics.
(Answered by Mr. Secretary Gladstone.) The figures for the year 1907 are not yet available. According to the verdicts of coroners' juries and the certificates of medical practitioners there were, in the year 1906, 64 deaths in London and 119 in the remainder of England and Wales caused by anæsthetics administered for operations. There appears to be some reason to doubt whether the certificates on which these returns are based are in all cases complete, and there must necessarily sometimes be difficulty in determining if death under an anæsthetic is caused by the anæsthetic. I propose, therefore, to make further inquiry into the matter.