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V.-FOOD
§ 1.—FOOD PREMISES.
The dairies, cowsheds, and milkshops, the slaughter-houses, the places where
foods are prepared, and the marketing places have been regularly visited and
inspected. The markets and marketing streets have also been regularly
inspected on Saturday nights and Sunday mornings during the summer
months.
.Bakehouses, restaurants, kitchens, and similar workplaces w here food is
prepared, being also controlled by the Factory and Workshop Acts, have been
dealt with under Part IV.
Covering and Protection of Food. — In the Lancet of the 22nd October, 1910,
under the heading "An Example from Rome," the following interesting
paragraph appeared: —
The Syndic, Signor Ernesto Nathan, has issued an "ordinanza" to safeguard
the public from a danger of long standing—the consumption of bread
and pastry which has been exposed in shop windows, or even at shop doors,
to the contamination of flies in the one case and of promiscuous dust in the
other. These articles of food must henceforth be exhibited to the buying citizen
under glass. Another risk which the " ordinanza " provides against is that of
the handling of these articles to test their consistency or freshness— a real risk
if one considers the neglect of personal ablution on the part of a public with
whom the nail-brush is by no means invariably an appurtenance of the toilet.
Henceforth the purchaser will be prevented from fingering the bread and
pastry exposed for sale, these articles having now to be exhibited under glass
furnished with " cartelli indicatori" (card labels). If, in violation of the
"ordinanza," they have been handled by the customer, they are to be
impounded and "esclusi dalla vendita" (removed from sale). Bakers are
forbidden to take back or to offer for sale such articles, even after being
"grattugiati" (grated), v\hich have been exposed and handled in restaurants
or carried back from private houses by the distributors. In restaurants or at
railway buffets bread will be put on the table in the necessary quantity, and
no more; it will be wrapped in paper; and, if already handled or left behind
by preceding guests, it cannot again be offered for consumption. Contravention
under any of these heads of the "ordinanza" incurs a severe penalty. The
Syndic is already assailed, censoriously, for these opportune measures; but
the better-inspired and better-mannered public are on his side, hoping as they
do that the worse than untidy practices at which they are aimed will gradually
disappear, like that of spitting in public vehicles or on the floors of restaurants
—a practice which died hard till its danger to public health was seen to be
not less real than its offence to decency.