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57
of the infants), sufficient for one days' food—each bottle being
enough for one "feed," or meal, and each bottle to be opened
immediately before use, and the milk taken out directly therefrom
without being transferred to any other vessel. Adjustable
teats or nipples should be used for this purpose, one being
applied as required to each bottle, and returned to, and changed
at, the Depot each day. In this way, method in feeding, as well
as proper and suitable food, will be secured. The price to be
charged should be 3d. per day (i.e., for 9 bottles or one basket),
or 1s. 6d. per week (i.e., for 63 bottles or seven baskets).
The milk to be distributed must be altered in composition so
as to be more alike to what nature intends for infants. This can
be readily done by mixing fresh and pure cow's milk with cream,
milk-sugar and whey, in such proportions as to secure the
average composition of human milk, viz:—
Water 88.00
Fat 2.90
Solids, not fat:
Proteids 3.07
Milk Sugar 5.87
Salts .16
9.10
100.00
The educational influence of such a Municipal Milk Depot
must not be lost sight of.
The experiment has already been tried successfully in France,
and in England at St. Helens, Ashton-under-Lyne, Liverpool,
and Battersea, and I prophesy even greater success in Lambeth,
if the scheme, as suggested above by me, be carried out, and the
help of the Hospitals and Institutions named above prove as
important as I anticipate.
Joseph Priestley,
Medical Officer of Health.
May 25th, 1903.