FOODS — HUMAN NUTRITION. 259 



the possibility of producing pellagra in the healthy human individual by a 

 restricted, mainly carbohydrate (cereal), diet. 



The subjects were 12 white convicts who had accepted the offer of a pardon 

 as an inducement to submit to the experiment. They were given a diet contain- 

 ing biscuits, corn bread, grits, rice, fried mush, brown gravy, sweet potatoes, 

 and cane sirup, the average energy value of a day's ration being 2,952 calories. 

 The entire population of the camp served as controls, but more especially 20 

 individuals who were under continuous surveillance similar to that of the sub- 

 jects of the experiment. The general sanitary environment of the controls and 

 subjects of the experiments was the same but personal cleanliness, cleanliness 

 of quarters, and freedom of insects were decidedly better in the case of the sub- 

 jects of the experiments. 



Of the 11 volunteers who completed the experiment 6 developed symptoms 

 which were diagnosed as pellagra. The first symptoms appeared in not later 

 than five months after the beginning of the restricted diet. The conclusion is 

 drawn that the pellagra in the 6 volunteers was the result of the restricted diet 

 on which they subsisted. 



The prevalence of pellagra. — Its possible relation to the rise in the cost 

 of food, E. Sydenstrickeu {Pub. Health Rjjts. [U. S.], 30 (1915), No. 43, pp. 

 3132-3148). — In this report data are presented regarding the income and diet 

 of workingmen's families, which were collected in investigations of family 

 budgets. From a discussion of this data the following conclusions, in part, 

 are drawn: 



" The lower the economic status of the white American family, the greater 

 is the pressure for sacrifices in diet, particularly in animal protein foods, since 

 animal protein foods are the most expensive, 



" The economic status of wage-earners' families in the Southern States, par- 

 ticularly of cotton-mill families, is lower than that of wage-earners' families 

 in other sections of the country. 



" Certain factors have tended to restrict the supply of protein foods in 

 southern industrial localities that do not restrict, at least to the same extent, 

 the supply of carbohydrates and hydrocarbons. Budgetary studies of a large 

 number of native white wage-earners' families, generally comparable as to 

 annual family income and size, indicate that the proportion of proteins in the 

 diet of southern families is considerably less and of carbohydrates and of 

 hydrocarbons considerably gi-eater than in the diet of northern families. . . . 



" The increase in retail food prices has been at least 40 per cent higher in 

 proteins than in carbohydrates or in hydrocarbons. 



" The available data thus point to a lessened financial ability of southern 

 wage-earners' families to provide a properly balanced diet, as well as a de- 

 crease in the availability (measured by retail prices) of an animal protein food 

 supply for the wageworking population, particularly since about 1907 or 1908." 



The prevention of pellagra. — A test of diet among institutional inmates, 

 J. GoLDBEEGEK, C. H. Waking, and D. G. Willets (Puh. Health Rpts. [U. S.l, 

 SO {1915), No. 43, pp. 3117-S131).— The diet at two orphanages where pellagi'a 

 had been endemic for several years was modified in accordance with the direc- 

 tions of the authors, as published in a previous paper (E. S. R., 32, p, 564). 

 The modifications consisted chiefly in a marked increase in the amounts of 

 fresh animal and leguminous protein foods and a reduction in the amount of 

 carbohydrate food. The hygienic and sanitary conditions remained unchanged. 



No evidence of a recurrence of the disease was observed in the 67 pellagrins 

 in one institution, and no new cases developed among the 99 nonpellagTin 

 residents, all of whom had been under observation for a year, since the change 



