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7.— That the provision of cow's milk produced under aseptic conditions
accompanied by extreme cleanliness, refrigeration and dispatch, so
diluted and enriched and put up in stoppered bottles in such quantities
to be administered at specified intervals suitable for suckling infants,
should be regarded not only as ordinary food, but in the nature of
medical assistance.
8.— That for the special protection of hand-fed infants it is desirable that
Municipal Authorities should not only ascertain the quality of milk
intended for infants by chemical analysis, and receive from the public
analyst a statement of the percentage composition of each sample of
milk submitted, as to fat, solids not fat, and total solids, and the absence
of chemical preservatives, but also by bacteriological examination, and
receive from a bacteriologist a statement in regard to each sample of
milk submitted as to the number of micro-organisms per cubic centimetre
and the proportion of lactic acid per cent., these being the best
existing tests of cleanliness and freshness of the milk.
With the whole of the above Resolutions, anyone with a knowledge of the
importance of the subject must be in complete accord, and the only points for
consideration are those of detail in carrying out the scheme. It should,
however, be pointed out that underlying the whole question is the danger,
from a public health point of view, of introducing in a subtle manner the evil
of municipal trading. As I have previously pointed out when reporting on
the Milk Depots (London) Bill in March, 1905, that in view of the opinion of
the Committee on Physical Deterioration that inasmuch as any difficulty in
obtaining pure and sterilised milk can be got over without recourse to direct
municipal action, any such trading by public authorities would be both an
unnecessary and costly charge upon the rates. Moreover, the proper function
of local authorities is to supervise traders rather than to enter into what must
necessarily be an unfair business competition with them.
Owing to the small number of inhabitants, and therefore children in the City,
the matter is not one of imminent importance so far as the City inhabitants
are concerned; but in view of the general increase of organised effort now made
to save these young lives, which are now doubly valuable to the State owing
to the continued decrease in the birth rate, Miss Pole, one of your Women
Sanitary Inspectors, who has previous experience of this work, has undertaken
the duty of visiting all houses where births have been notified by the
Registrars, and also those where deaths of children under one year of age
have occurred.
The main object of these visits is to impress upon mothers the great
advantage of breast-feeding as compared with hand-feeding. It has been shown
that in some large towns the mortality during the first year of life among
breast-fed infants was only about one-third of that among hand-fed children.
It is impossible to overrate the significance of these figures, which clearly
indicate a great loss of life from a preventable cause.