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the Local Government Board, and by the periodical inspection of the
relatively small number (100) of houses which we have been able to
place upon the register, we are adopting, in my opinion, a useful
measure in the interest of the health of the Parish.
FOOD AND DRUGS.
Under the sale of Food and Drugs Acts, 48 samples of Food and
Drugs were taken and analysed. The results are shown in Table C.
Five of the samples were not genuine and, therefore, the percentage of
non-genuine samples amounted to 10.4 per cent.,a figure which is lower
than that of the preceding year, when it was 11.3 per cent.
26 per cent. of the milk samples were adulterated. According
to the last Report of the Local Government Board, 12.9 per cent.
of the milk samples taken in London are adulterated as against just
below 10 per cent, for the rest of England, and dealing with the
country as a whole, the following interesting facts may be referred
to here.
The proportion of adulterated samples was 8.7 per cent. of those
examined. This is the lowest percentage of adulteration ever
recorded, and less than one-half of the rate for the years 1877 and
1878. It must be conceded that it is somewhat surprising that the
1875 Act should have done the community such good service, seeing
that for the year 1898 more than a third of the fines inflicted for
offences were of only 10s. or under.
It may be of interest to indicate the extent to which the various
articles taken for analysis were found to be adulterated. First on the
list come spirit and drugs, with a percentage adulteration of some 12
per cent. each. Sweet spirits of nitre, Gregory's powder, lime water,
sulphur, rhubarb, magnesia, wax, cream of tartar, and seidlitz
powders figured among the adulterated drugs, and it is somewhat
disconcerting to read in the Report that eight out of the twenty-five
prescriptions dispensed and sold under the Act were improperly
or carelessly compounded. Sago and olive oil were adulterated to
the extent of some 11 per cent.; then come coffee with 10 per cent.
of adulterated samples; milk, 8.7 per cent.; vinegar, 5.8 per cent.;
mustard, 4 per cent.; sugar, confectionery, and jam, 3 per cent.;