Antall József szerk.: Orvostörténeti közlemények 78-79. (Budapest, 1976)

TANULMÁNYOK - Mádai Lajos: Településhigiénés és demográfiai viszonyok a fővárosban az 1870-es években (angol nyelven)

City district. In Terézváros, Józsefváros, and Ferencváros the situation was still worse. Here the average density was 4 people per room, while in Kőbánya it was even more: 4.5. Forty per cent of the inhabitants (78,727 persons) lived in flats where six or more people were forced to share a room. 58% of the population had to have strangers in their homes, lodgers or night-lodgers. Twenty per cent of all inhabitants in Pest (41,415 persons) were night-lodgers. Statistics of basement-flats make the picture still dramatic. In 1870 these flats gave home to 10% of the Pest people (20,127 persons). The situation was similar also in 1880. The average density per room changed from 3.06 only to 2.90. 56% of the population lived in one-roomed flats with an average of 4.5 persons. 29% of the population lived in overcrowded homes with 6 or more people in one room. The number of those living in basement dwellings on the Pest side increased from 20,127 in 1870 to 29,764 in 1880; 8.9% of the total population of the capital (30,441 persons) lived in the damp basements. Their rate was the highest in wards no. VII (15.5%), ward no. VIII (14%), and in the Vlth and IXth wards (11.6% and 14.3% resp.). These were the wards where the number of the basementflats increased the most rapidly between 1870 and 1880. Housebuilding was getting significant only towards the late 1870's, but was far from satisfying the needs of the population. Between 1874 and 1880 the number of the rooms increased by 10,351, i.e. 1,479 per year, while the growth of the population between 1874 and 1881 was 73,900, i.e. a yearly average of 10,557 persons. The serious shortage in houses is reflected also in that about 23,000 persons lived on business promises and in workshops. During the replanning of the town new streets were opened and many old houses were demolished.* (Between 1874 and 1880 211 houses were pulled down with 3,143 rooms). The former lodgers of the pulled-down houses could not afford the higher rents of their new flats, and were therefore crowded into smaller and less expensive flats. Owing to their bad financial circumstances they had to share their flats also with subtenants and night-lodgers. The paradoxical thing in all this is that in 1879 3,808 flats stood empty, 650 of which belonged to the cheapest to be rent. Apart from the economic, social, and cultural conditions, the health of the population was influenced also by factors of environment, i.e. by the hygienic conditions of air, soil and water. In contrast with the climate of Buda and Óbuda surrounded by the hills, that of Pest was quite unprotected, Pest being an open country on the edge of the Great Plains with east-west anticyclones travelling above it very often. Fluctuation of temperature is greater here than on the Buda side. Wind-blown sand was not fixed around 1873 either by a shelter belt or by family houses with gardens, and as a consequence dust was the main factor of air pollution. Removal of rubbish was also not organized centrally. Junk-heaps on various points of the city did not only contribute to air pollution but also provided a good breeding ground for rats and flies disseminating epidemics. The conditions of the soil and drinking water could be solved only by solving the problem of drainage first. At the end of the 1870's two thirds of the streets in the city were provided with sewers, but the old system was unhealthy and not sufficient. * The Avenue (the present Népköztársaság Street) was finished in 1876 and the costs amounted to 1,137,762 forints.