Food Poisoning and Food Infection 283 



be reckoned with. The steps through which the milk must pass 

 before it is poured into a glass on your dinner table necessitate 

 that proper safe-guards be instituted to correct for any mistakes 

 made in sanitary practices along the line. When a human being 

 draws milk from the animal, whether it be by hand or by milking 

 machine, there is always the possibility that pathogenic bacteria 

 from the person or organisms from an improperly disinfected milk- 

 ing machine might find their way into the milk with eventual 

 harm being done to the unsuspecting consumer. Even if we did 

 drink milk directly from the cow's udder the way the calf does, 

 there is always the possibility that the cow may be suffering from 

 tuberculosis or from brucellosis in the early preclinical stages not 

 readily detected from day to day by casual observation. 



A frequent argument heard in opposition to pasteurization is 

 that "boiling the milk imparts a cooked flavor to it and ruins the 

 food value of the product." A temperature of 145° F. is a long way 

 from 212° F., the boiling point at sea level. Properly pasteurized 

 milk cannot normally be detected when the blind-fold test is run 

 on a large number of subjects. As for the food value being ruined, 

 the greatest harm that pasteurization does to raw milk is to affect 

 vitamin C, in which raw milk is deficient to begin with. Even 

 though a child is fed raw milk, some vitamin C and iron are added 

 to supplement the diet. If it is necessary to feed orange juice, 

 cod-liver oil, and vegetables to make up for these nutritional 

 deficiencies in raw milk, why not feed a little more of these supple- 

 ments, pasteurize the milk, and be assured that the child is getting 

 a safe product? 



The evidence that pasteurization is a desirable health measure 

 is too overwhelming to be refuted. Some large progressive cities 

 have passed ordinances requiring that only pasteurized milk be 

 sold within their city limits. Such measures will pay rich dividends 

 in public health, but you can't expect to convince every resident 

 that pasteurization is a good thing. After all, "Grandfather drank 

 raw milk all his life, and he lived to be 90, etc." Wasn't grand- 

 father fortunate? Should anyone need convincing as to the wise- 

 ness of pasteurization, let him observe just one small child 



