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7
FOREWORD.
ON FOOD.
Amongst the several matters to which consideration is given in this report
one dealt with at some length is Food. In one section space is devoted to a
description of the work done in relation to slaughter-houses, cowsheds and
dairies, and to indicating the nature and amount of foodstuffs condemned as unfit
for food, and in another the number of samples of milk, etc., submitted for
analysis and of visits paid to restaurants, etc., is set out. The amount of work
involved in carrying out the inspections, sampling, etc., is very considerable. It
is amongst the most important of the duties performed in the Public Health
Department, and one to which too much attention cannot be given, having regard
to the real risks to health in the form not only of definite disease but of less
obvious interferences with bodily welfare resulting from what may be called a
reduction in the nutritive quality of the food. Of the definite diseases the most
outstanding are those that belong to the same group as typhoid (enteric fever). All
of these are due to germs derived from filth, and the chances of contamination
of food from such germs through blown dust, flies and in other ways are tremendous.
Amongst the conditions due to lack of nutritive quality are rickets
and the many dis'orders that for want of better names are grouped as "malnutrition"
and "general debility," which are now so common, particularly
amongst children. The main causes of the interference with the nutritive quality
of the food are lack of freshness and the application of methods of preservation
adopted by one or more of the parties concerned in the production and marketing
of foods.
Considerable as is the amount of work done by the Department in the way
of supervision, inspection, sampling, and so on, very little of it can really be
counted as effective in ensuring complete freedom from contamination at all or
any of the stages or hands through which the bulk of articles pass before they
reach the consumer. As regards the use of preservatives and methods of preservation,
which are, of course, vast in extent, the amount of control obtained along
the lines of procedure adopted is infinitesimal.
In the sampling of food—milk and dairy produce generally and other articles
—all that is aimed at and that can be assured is that so far as composition is
concerned it is satisfactory; that, in fact, the consumer is not paying for an
inferior article. The analysis is a chemical analysis, and no opinion is given or
can be given as to whether or not the food is good from a nutritive or any other
health point of view. It is true that the presence of chemical preservatives can
be detected, and it may be suggested that they are only there because the food
is less fresh than it should be, or have been added in order that the article may
be kept longer than in the interests of the consumer is justifiable. Even so,
however, very little can be done at present by the Council to prevent the use of
these objectionable substances.