Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 85.djvu/17

Rh epidemics which have affected the patrons of dairies where every possible precaution was taken shows that no raw milk can be considered a safe food. For infants, breast milk is the only proper nutriment, but for babies who can not possibly receive a mother's care, and for older children and adults, we have fortunately a simple and efficient protection in pasteurization. This process, which involves simply the heating of the milk to a temperature of 145° or thereabouts for a period of twenty minutes, represents the application of the saving grace of cookery to the food product which of all food products needs it most. Unlike scalding or boiling pasteurization does not alter the taste of milk, and one of the most effective ways of guarding the household against disease is to see that all milk which enters it is properly pasteurized. There is no more excuse for drinking raw cow's milk than for eating raw beef.

A third danger, but far less important than those inherent in water or milk, lies in the consumption of raw shellfish which have been grown, or more commonly fattened (swelled up and made to seem more plump by immersion for a time in brackish water), in tidal estuaries exposed to sewage pollution. Fortunately it appears that during the winter months oysters, at least, enter into a state of practical hibernation, closing their shells and taking in little water from outside. Under such conditions sewage bacteria, already present within the shell, soon die out and the oyster even when taken from polluted waters becomes a comparatively safe source of food. Most of the famous epidemics of typhoid fever caused by shellfish have occurred in the months from September to November, after the eating of raw shellfish begins and before hibernation has set in. The eating of raw or partially cooked shellfish (steamed clams, fried oysters, oyster stew) from unknown sources, particularly in the autumn months, is, however, a dangerous practise until the oyster industry is more thoroughly supervised than at present.

Finally, in connection with the transmission of disease by food, the danger of infection of any and all foods in the process of preparation should always be kept in view. If for example, sandwiches are prepared by a typhoid carrier, an epidemic is likely to result, as was the case recently in a town of Illinois. I have referred to Mary Mallon, our most famous American case of the carrier in the kitchen. After a brief incarceration by the New York City Health department, this woman was set free and she may now under another name be cooking for some one of the readers of this article. Not only water and milk and shellfish, but meats and vegetables and bread and forks and spoons and tumblers may be infected by a cook or a waitress who is a carrier, and many obscure cases of disease are traceable to this cause. The tragedy of such an occurrence was once personally brought home to me with keenness by the death of one of the most promising