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32
APPENDIX
Report of the Public Analyst (C. Harcourt Wordsworth, B.Sc.(Lond.),
F.R.I.C.) for the year ended 31st December, 1960.
To the Mayor, Aldermen and Councillors
of the Metropolitan Borough of Paddington.
Your Worship, Ladies and Gentlemen,
During the year under review the number of samples submitted
under the Food and Drugs Act, 1955, was again 600. Of these,
nineteen were made the subject of special reports and most concerned
complaints of food containing foreign substances which included
a cigarette end, cloth, glass fragments, sand, cement, dust, paint and
mould. Adverse reports were also issued upon other samples which
were unsatisfactory.
These were jam deficient in sugar, dried fruit salad in an
infected condition and Glauber's Salt B.P., which was found to be
anhydrous or free from the water naturally present in the true
crystalline powder. The absence of this water made the drug too
strong and although it might be encouraging to get more than was
paid for, drugs are prescribed by dose and it is important that only
those of correct strength shall be supplied.
Most of the foods and drugs analysed were quite satisfactory,
and it may be concluded that the wide variety of articles again
sampled by your Inspector were of good general quality. It is worth
recording that 273 samples of milk were taken and analysed, and
although a few approached the minimum standards below which
milk is presumed to be not genuine, none was found to have been
either watered or skimmed.

In recent years there has been a great advance in the sale of
pre-packed foods and careful watch is maintained on the style and
wording of the labels and advertising matter connected with such
articles.
There are now many Food Standards specifying either the
composition of the main ingredients of a food, or limiting the
amounts of added preservatives or contaminating material which
might have found its way into the finished product from, say, crop
spraying residues. Quality of food is governed also by " Codes of
Practice " issued as compositional food standards by the Ministry
after discussions with the Trade. Although not having the full legal