CONTAGIOUS DISEASES ACT.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XIX, Issue 6534, 26 October 1882, Page 3

CONTAGIOUS DISEASES ACT.

The Lancet of August 19, which arrived by last mail, has the following :—

The annual rep rt by the Assistant Commissioner o I'olice on the operation of the Contagious l-is-ases Acts during the year ISSI, appears opportunely, j'jEt as the report of t e Select Committee c:i tin.- subject isftttrnctingattention. The results for tiiu year are very satisfactory, allowing us tht-ydoa decrease in the number of registered prostitutes and in the number of brothels iu the pri.t-jcted districts. During the yeiir, of 459 jtrosittutt'S wiio cume into ■ tliese ilia it lets from pLictid uot under tliu -• cts, '611, or GS.S per cent were found to be ilizenLcd on their fln»t nietik-al exacheck upon the luo-uu* of-spreading so frightful a iiis.iv.-ic '1 lie oi tlie is shown by the fact that 74 girls under ekhteen years "f age, Sβ women fn m eighteen to th rty, and 4 above thirty, who were found in bad company, and improper places, but hai not commenced a life of prostitution, were rescued ; wliile 32 un !er eighteen, and <J7 ahove that age, "«lim had commenced an immoral life, abandoned it on ciutioued by the police." There are numerous tnldeii appended to the numbers both of women ami brothels in "all the districts since the Actd came into operation. In lStil', when the Act was paraed, there were in ih» subjected districts 130 prostitutes ucder sixteen years if age and of thc.~e nearly one-fouTth were under fiftc* n■* win e in ISSI, there were none under the latter ace, ami only b" under sixteen. There has al-o been a Tory treat reduction in the number of public-Louses and Ijeer-houses where cumin-, n u\men re.-i ed, or which were f rovide.l with uccomniudation fur the puiposis of prostitution. ' in the last ten years such publicjhousts have been-reduced from w to-12, andletrhouses frt la 40 t 3. Jf pci io.l thun :0 yeais foe taken, tlie reduction i» still m u re striking, oi the i 2 still exi-tin ? trT.re are S, and of the 3 one. in the Chatham district. Such, a fact is far from creditable to the magistrates with whom the powi rof granting .ejecting the suu(>res:ion of such haunts of vice. M'e fire glad to obj..rve that tha duty of the police specially employed under tlio Acts has been very factorily discharged, there liaving been only one case r>f exoesi or violation of duty brought to notice duiing the year.