FOOD 



inspector in a town or county. The 

 duties and powers of those ap- 

 pointed to look after food inspec- 

 tion are laid down in various Acts 

 of Parliament, and administered 

 in the first place by the ministry of 

 health and the Scottish board 

 of health. 



The ministry of health for 

 England and Wales may be 

 taken as the typical department 

 responsible for this phase of ptiblic 

 health work. It has a chief in- 

 spector of foods, who is respon- 

 sible for administration. Under 

 him are a number of other in- 

 spectors, medical men, largely 

 travelling inspectors, whose duty 

 is to keep in touch with the differ- 

 ent parts of England. They also 

 supervise the inspection of foreign 

 foodstuffs arriving at different 

 parts. All these officials report to 

 the chief inspector of foods, who 

 in his turn reports to the head of 

 the department. Then, outside the 

 Government share of the work, 

 there is the whole army of public 

 health and sanitary officials em- 

 ployed by counties, towns, or other 

 administrative areas. 



In a large town the official re- 

 sponsible to the corporation for 

 the inspection of food is the 

 medical officer of health, or, by 

 arrangement, the chief sanitary 

 inspector. With him will be 

 possibly a qualified veterinary 

 surgeon, who inspects particularly 

 the abattoirs, dairies, cowsheds, 

 meat, and milk. In addition there 

 will be a staff of expert food 

 inspectors, who visit the vaxious 

 food shops periodically, take 

 samples for analysis, and re- 

 port on the general conditions of 

 their area. In a smaller town, all 

 these multifarious duties are sup- 

 posed to be carried out by the 

 medical officer of health. Large 

 cities have a specially appointed 

 analyst for checking adulteration 

 of foodstuffs, and, in smaller towns 

 or scattered areas, a number of 

 local authorities may combine in 

 order to seciire the services of one 

 analyst between them. In this way 

 there is a fairly thorough inspection 

 of all the different kinds of foods 

 throughout the whole country. 

 Imported Foodstuffs 



Special attention is paid to im- 

 ported foodstuffs. Food inspection 

 at the ports is under the super- 

 vision of the medical officer of 

 health of the port in question, who 

 is assisted by other expert tech- 

 nical inspectors. It is their busi- 

 ness to see, not merely that all 

 foods arriving in this country are 

 in a condition fit for human con- 

 sumption, but also that only such 

 foodstuffs come in as are per- 

 mitted by the foreign meat regula- 



3236 



tions and other laws affecting im- 

 ports. In this latter part of their 

 work the food inspectors are as- 

 sisted by H.M. Customs. 



A food inspector, apart from 

 the heads of departments, who are 

 usually qualified medical men or 

 veterinary surgeons, requires a 

 special training. The royal com- 

 mission on tuberculosis" recom- 

 mended in 1898 that no person be 

 permitted to act as a meat in- 

 spector until he had passed a 

 qualifying examination before such 

 authority as may be prescribed by 

 the local government board or 

 the board of agriculture. As a 

 matter of fact, in recent years all 

 inspectors in important districts 

 have been required to pass the 

 examinations of one or other of 

 the institutions which teach for 

 this purpose. 



Apart altogether, however, from 

 his technical training, the food 

 inspector must have certain quali- 

 ties, without which he is use- 

 less. Outstanding amongst these 

 is that of transparent honesty. 

 Acting in the interests of the 

 public as he does, he must be 

 fair to the consumer, producer, 

 and vendor, and for this reason it 

 is extremely important that the 

 food inspector should be a whole- 

 time official. 



Statutory Powers 



Before the Great War the in- 

 spection of food in the United 

 Kingdom was carried out under 

 certain statutory powers com- 

 prised chiefly in the Public Health 

 Act, 1875 ; the Public Health Acts 

 Amendment Act, 1890 ; the Public 

 Health (London) Act, 1891 ; the 

 Sale of Horseflesh Regulation Act, 

 1899; the Markets and Fairs 

 Clauses Act, 1847 ; the Towns 

 Improvement Clauses Act, 1847 ; 

 and the Foreign Meat regulations. 

 These various Acts or sections of 

 Acts set forth the statutory powers 

 of local authorities, medical offi- 

 cers, and inspectors, as well as 

 dealing with definitions and the 

 procedure in courts. 



In addition, a considerable 

 number of Acts have been passed 

 with reference to the adulteration 

 of food. They are especially the 

 Bread Act, 1836 ; the Sale of Food 

 and Drugs Act. 1875, amended in 

 1879 and 1899 ; the Margarine 

 Act, 1887; the Butter and Mar- 

 garine Act, 1907 ; the Public 

 Health (Regulations as to Food) 

 Act, 1907 ; and the regulations as 

 to unsound food and foreign meat. 



It should be mentioned that it 

 is no part of the duty of a medical 

 officer of health to make analyses 

 of food or of drugs in order to de- 

 tect any adulteration that may be 

 present. He may be appointed by 



a local authority for this purpose, 

 or they may appoint the inspector 

 of nuisances as an inspector under 

 the Sale of Food and Drugs Acts, 

 and this is not infrequently done. 

 As a rule, however, all the analyses 

 for local authorities are carried out 

 by borough or county analysts 

 appointed for the purpose. 



During the Great War a large 

 number of orders were issued by 

 the ministry of food, all of which 

 superseded, as long as they were 

 in existence, the operation of the 

 various Acts mentioned above, so 

 far as the special foodstuffs dealt 

 with were concerned. These orders, 

 however, mainly dealt with ques- 

 tions of prices, or methods of dis- 

 tribution, and not as a rule with 

 quality, so that they did not 

 materially affect the duties of 

 food inspectors as before defined. 

 Foreign Systems of Inspection 



In most civilized countries food 

 inspection proceeds very much 

 along the lines indicated above. 

 The U.S.A. have a very thorough 

 system of meat inspection, termed 

 the federal meat -inspection ser- 

 vice. The inspectors must com- 

 plete a three years' course at a 

 veterinary college, and the meat 

 inspector is required, in addition, 

 to be an expert in pickling, salting, 

 smoking, and otherwise curing 

 meat. Experienced inspectors 

 travel through Country districts 

 and submit their reports to Wash- 

 ington. In addition, the various 

 States issue their own regulations 

 under their health departments. 



In the British colonies and 

 dominions a similar system is in 

 force to that of the mother country, 

 but in addition special veterinary 

 inspectors are appointed to exa- 

 mine all the carcasses in the great 

 freezing works, such as those of 

 New Zealand and Australia, and 

 every carcass coming into Great 

 Britain bears a ticket upon which 

 is the name of the inspector who 

 examined it. In France veterinary 

 supervision of abattoirs dates from 

 1882, and is now under the general 

 supervision of the ministry of agri- 

 culture. In Germany, where tuber- 

 culosis in cattle is extremely 

 common, the meat-inspection law 

 obtains throughout the empire, 

 and covers even the smaller 

 slaughterhouses. In Scandinavia, 

 Denmark, and Holland meat in- 

 spection is very carefully carried 

 out by well-trained officials. 



Q. Leighton.M.D. 



Bibliography. The Meat Industry 

 and Meat Inspection, Leighton and 

 Douglas, 1910: The Food In- 

 spector's Handbook, F. Vacher, 

 1913 ; Bell's Sale of Food and Drugs, 

 C. F. Lloyd, 1914; Practical Meat 

 and Food Inspection, W. Robertson, 

 1908. 



