Kapronczay Károly szerk.: Orvostörténeti Közlemények 202-205. (Budapest, 2008)

TANULMÁNYOK — ARTICLES - VARGA, Gabriella: A comparative study of the social-political determinants of infant and child mortality in Sweden and Hungary 1850-1945. - Összehasonlító tanulmány a svéd és a magyar csecsemőhalandóság szociálpolitikai tényezőiről 1850 és 1945 között

Risk to die was higher for infants who lived in overcrowded dwellings, in some particular districts and whose mothers were unmarried. Statistics show that more than 90% of children who died under I year and under 5 years lived in dwellings with more than 3 persons per room (Bp. Sz.főváros h., 1901). We do not know the standard of the dwellings but the elevated risk to die in particular districts suggests serious problems. IMR was sometimes double in one district compared to another. IMR was 176 in one of the poorest districts (the 3

rd municipality) compared to 87 in the inner city (the 4

th municipality - please notice that the number of the districts in Budapest are not the same in the present) in 1902. Slowly, but these numbers have gradually decreased, and 40 years later the IMR was 83 in the poorest district, and 68 in the well-to-do areas. (Bakács, 1948). The 3

ld district in Budapest is situated in the periphery or the city, therefore it was much more influenced by immigration than the 4

th district with its traditional bourgeois population in the inner-city. Between 1881-1910, Budapests population doubled, increased with more than 400 000 inhabitants from ca. 404 000 to 830 000. (Melly, 1928) This was also the period when the city had established the Public Health Local Housing Committee promoting a policy stating that every house should have piped-water (Kapronczay, 2001). Two percent of Budapests inhabitants had water closets in 1910. The poorest, industrial workers lived in "one room-kitchen apartments" with other 400-500 in the same building and they constituted the 60% of the population of the capital city. Among them IMR, rates of alcoholism and tuberculosis was very high. Ninety percent of the tuberculosis cases came from these groups. (Kapronczay, 2001). Another immigration wave to Hungary and Budapest came after the Treaty of Trianon after World War I when Hungary lost 2/3 of its territory and 1/3 of its population. As a result of the border redrawing, 1.1 million migrated from the lost regions to the remaining territory of Hungary, great numbers to Budapest (Kapronczay, 2001). At last but not at least the heterogeneity of Budapest also had an effect on IMR at the end of the 19

th century. The population of Hungary practiced their religion freely which was established in Transylvania (being then a land of the Hungarian Crown) in 1568 (among the first in European history) by King John Sigismund when he proclaimed the charter of "Declaration of Turda", an edict of religious tolerance (http://www.dmuuc.org/about/ UUhistory.html). Half of the countrys population were Roman Catholics, 11% Greek Catholics, 13,7% Orthodox, 21% different Protestants and 3,6% Israelites. (M. St. Évk, 1893) In Budapest the composition of the population by religious groups was the following. Seventy per cent were Catholics, 18% Israelites and the rest of the children belonged to different Protestant congregations and Orthodox denominations. Children born out of wedlock showed different patterns in these groups, they were the highest represented among Catholics and the lowest represented among Israelites, 32% vs. 10% in 1894 (Budapest Székesfőváros, 1895). It has also been possible to trace differences in IMR based on religious background. In Budapest, under-5 mortality was the highest among Catholics. In the 20-year period between 1874-94, the risk of dying before reaching the age of 5 was consistently 50% higher among children of Catholic parents then Israelites. (Bp. Sz.főváros St. évk, 1895). Budapest had to deal with very high immigration level during the study period when overcrowding and the undeveloped infrastructure were more common in society. Mortality among infants of the unmarried mothers and the poorest parents showed a very alanning