706 EXPEEIMENT STATION RECORD. 



Another phase of farm sanitation which is in a measure being cared 

 for by this Department, state boards of health, and some agricultural 

 colleges, is that which has to do with the handling of farm produce, 

 such as milk, butter, and other perishable goods. Legislation, in 

 requiring the inspection of dairy stock and of milk products, etc., 

 protects the consumer in a way, but if the farm dairy is unclean or 

 the water supply polluted, such measures will still fail to produce 

 clean milk and butter. It is obvious that such a farm must be kept 

 in a much better sanitary condition than might be tolerated upon the 

 ordinary farm. This will involve an increasing system of inspection, 

 but to be really effective this must also be for a time largely a cam- 

 paign of education. This is already recognized in many cities, which 

 have devoted considerable attention to personal instruction and help 

 of dairy producers. What is being done in the dairy line might well 

 be extended to other food products, whose proper care and handling 

 are matters for public concern. 



In addition to prevwiting the spread of communicable diseases, the 

 general problem of rural sanitation also involves the improvement of 

 the general health and well-being of the farmer and his family so 

 that they may be better able to resist not only the communicable dis- 

 eases, but also the noninfectious or constitutional diseases which are 

 also important factors in the death rates of rural districts. Instruc- 

 tion in personal hygiene is even needed in some cases, especially in 

 the case of school children upon whose minds such information will 

 produce a greater impression and lead to better results than is likely 

 to be the case with older people whose habits of living have become 

 more or less fixed. This phase of the problem is hardly one for the 

 extension worker, but it opens wide another door of opportunity for 

 the rural school, and perhaps for such agencies as the newly organ- 

 ized town and country nursing service of the American Red Cross. 

 Its effective utilization will, of course, involve the adequate training 

 of the teacher and the nurse, and in many parts of the country a 

 radical improvement in the sanitary condition of the school building 

 itself. 



In many communities this phase might well constitute the begin- 

 ning of the campaign for improvement in rural sanitation, and the 

 reconstructed rural school become the starting point of a demonstra- 

 tion to be extended to the individual home through the efforts of the 

 college extension staff. Such a campaign, if successful, would do 

 much to make farm life at once more profitable, more healthful, and 

 more attractive, and by so doing contribute to safeguard the food 

 supply, and therefore the health and the efficiency of the nation. 



