Cause of death ok. b. sj.

[Katie]

Hello,
Can you please tell me what is ok. b. sj. as a cause of death. I found this in Hiski while looking up deaths of ancestors. In 1767 (and maybe before and after 1767) I found large numbers of infants, weeks old or a month old that died from the above disease. At first I thought it was pneumonia or lung problem but I'm not sure. What would cause so many babies, young infants toddlers to die at this time. I checked several other cities and it was the same thing which looks like an epidemic of some sort.
Can you please help me solve this problem?
Thank You
Janice

[mikkau]

Hi,

It means "okänd barnsjukdom" = unknown children's disease.

[JaskaS]

This is a good link for abbreviations, occupations and causes of death: http://www.saunalahti.fi/hirvela/indexuk.html
Worth bookmarking in your browser.

Jaska

[Katie]

Thank you for reviewing cause of death. I have the link mentioned bookmarked. I see that the motality rate among children was high in the 1700's but in this one year, and perhaps the year before and after, it looks as though there was an epidemic that spread through the country. I counted the above cause for towns/cities that names began with A through K and came up with 742 infants died in 1767. If you were to double the 742 for the cities L through Z you would come to aproximately 1500 infants died, therefore I thought of an epidemic, probably lung related since it affected children that were only weeks or few months old. If anyone should know what this mysterious disease could have been during that time I would be interested in knowing, if not it remains a mystery.
Thank you for your help, I appreciate it very much
Janice

[EevaH]

Yes, you are right, before the vaccination, most children died in epidemics which spread around with regular intervals. In my observations, the illness most often fatal to infants was whooping cough. I do not see it in year 1767, but in 1763 lots of children died of whooping cough in this area (around Mikkeli), most of them 0-2 years old. Other epidemics, like smallpox, measles or scarlet fever were less selective, and the digestive tract illnesses like dysentery or typhoid even less so.

[Katie]

Hello, Eeva
Thank you so much for your reply. I, also, am thinking Whooping Cough, although the others could not be ruled out. How sad for all those families to lose a new member to their family and to be helpless in curing them.
I appreciate you replying to my post.
Have a nice week.
Janice