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256
1909]
" American indifference is the attitude of unconcern manifested by Great
" Britain. Of American pork products, she buys far more than all the rest of
" the world purchases ; in 1904, for example, the United Kingdom took more
" than 80 per cent. of the exports of American bacon and hams, and more than
" 60 per cent. of all exported fresh and salted pork. Suppose that the English
" Government, following the example of Germany, had made the importation
" of American pork products dependent upon this microscopic examination for
"trichina, is it likely that the United States would have refused it, no matter
" what the cost ? Is England indifferent to the health of her people?
" It would be folly to expect the United States to show greater solicitude for
" the health of the English working man than his own Government manifests.
" But no one can doubt that the microscopic examination of every pound of
" pork-products going to England would have been granted for the sake of the
" continued trade if the English Government had seen fit to ask for it." (The
italics are Dr. Liffingwell's).
He then gives extracts from the reports of the Chief of the Bureau of
Animal Industry for the several years, 1902-1906, and also tabulates figures
for 1900-1906 as follows :—
FEDERAL INSPECTIONS OF PORK, 1900-1906.
Total number of hogs slaughtered under Government
inspection171,152,281
Number of these examined for trichina 4,102,330
Number of carcases found with trichina-like bodies of
disintegrating trichinae 54,507
Number of carcases containing living parasites 54,237
Per cent. of carcases examined found infested by
trichinae (half of which were alive) 2.65
From these figures he deduces the facts that one carcase in 38 examined
presented evidence of being or having been infected by trichinae. He next
urged that, as there were 203,000,000 hogs slaughtered under Government
inspection during 1900-1907, and that as trichina was as common among all
animals as among those whose carcases were examined, it followed " that,
during this period of eight years, over five million carcases of hogs, or about a
thousand million pounds of pork, infested with trichinae, at least half of which
at the time of slaughter were potent for mischief, were turned into the meat
supply of an unsuspecting world."