§ 66. Mr. FELLasked if the death rate among the Natives employed in the mines on the Rand recruited from tropical countries is increasing; if so, to what is this attributed; and how does the present death rate among the Natives compare with the death rate among the Chinese formerly employed there?
Mr. HARCOURTI am not aware that there has been anything of the nature of a continuous increase. From time to time the rate fluctuates, generally owing to epidemics of pneumonia. The deaths of tropical Natives employed in the mines amounted in March last to a rate of 71.8 per mille per annum, against an average of 75, 64.8 and 47.6 for the whole of the years 1910, 1911 and 1912 respectively. These figures are not inclusive of deaths at the compound before the Natives began work, and the total mortality, including these deaths, amounted to a figure many times that of the Chinese mortality. Particulars of the latter from January, 1906, to February, 1908, are given in the Parliamentary Paper, Cd. 4120.
§ Mr. FELLWithout going into the exact figures is it not generally the case that the death rate amongst these Natives from Central Africa is about seven times as great as it used to be amongst the Chinese?