London's Pulse: Medical Officer of Health reports 1848-1972

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Kensington 1930

[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for Kensington Borough]

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56
The formidable task of making detailed inspections of all houses let in lodgings in the borough,
which was commenced in 1923, was completed in the early weeks of 1931, and the Council now have
a valuable record of all houses inspected.
The by-laws for houses let in lodgings have been proved to be of the greatest use and, together
with the work under Section 17 of the Housing Act already referred to, they are a valuable instrument
in maintaining habitable conditions in houses let in lodgings in North Kensington. The following
is a record of the work carried out under the by-laws during the year 1930 :—
No. of houses inspected under the by-laws 2,535
Total number of inspections 9,683
No. of instances where the houses were cleansed under the by-laws 1,031
FOOD SUPPLY.
MILK SUPPLY.
Milk and Dairies (Consolidation) Act, 1915.—This Act has for its main object the prevention
of the sale of milk from tuberculous cows. It enables County Councils and County Borough
Councils to make Orders which will prohibit the sale of infected milk in any area.
When the Act came into operation the Council decided that a number of samples of milk
should be taken each year for the purpose of examination for the presence tubercle bacilli. In
the year 1930, twenty-four samples were so taken, and all were certified as being free from tubercle
bacilli.
Composition of Milk supplied in Kensington.—It is well known that the "limits" of 3 per cent.
of fat and 8.5 per cent. of non-fatty solids, which are taken by the Ministry of Agriculture as the
primary criteria of genuineness of milk, are figures very much below those found in normal cow's
milk.
The following may be taken as the average composition of cow's milk :—
Water 87.4 per cent.
Fat 3.7 „ „
Non-fatty solids 8.9 „ „
Of 334 formal samples of milk taken under the Food and Drugs (Adulteration) Act in 1930,
18 were certified by the Public Analyst as adulterated, i.e., containing less than 3 per cent. of fat
or 8.5 per cent. of non-fatty solids. These particulars, however, do not give any indication of the
general quality of the milk supplied in Kensington, therefore, it will be interesting to note the
average composition of the samples taken in the borough during the year. These figures are
given in the following table :—

Average Composition of Formal Milk Samples taken in 1930.

Months.Number of formal samples taken.Average composition of all samples submitted, genuine and adulterated.Average composition of genuine samples.Ministry of Agriculture Standard.
Percentage of milk fat.Percentage of solids not fat.Percentage of milk fat.Percentage of solids not fatPercentage of milk fat.Percentage of solids not fat
January303.598.773.618.763.08.5
February183.548.863.588.85
March263.478.803.498.80
April183.458.773.498.79
May443.408.853.588.86
June363.438.813.478.81
July443.538.713.528.75
September393.728.793.728.79
October193.928.913.928.91Average composition of normal cow's milk
November243.898.903.898.90
December363.858.813.858.81
Percentage of milk fat.Percentage of solids not fat.
3343.608.813.638.783.78.9

It is interesting to note that the average fat content of Kensington samples exceeded the
Ministry of Agriculture standard by approximately 20 per cent. or, in other words, the samples
would have been returned as genuine by the Public Analyst even though about 20 per cent. of the
fat might have been removed by a fraudulent vendor.