EXAMINATION OF SHELLFISH 247 



Royal Sewage Commission after an extensive investi- 

 gation on this subject came to the following conclusion : 

 " After carefully considering the whole of the evidence 

 on this point, we are satisfied that a considerable num- 

 ber of cases of enteric fever and other illness are 

 caused by the consumption of shellfish which have been 

 exposed to sewage contamination; but in the present 

 state of knowledge, we do not think it possible to make 

 an accurate numerical statement. 



" Moreover an examination of the figures which 

 have been placed before us as regards those towns in 

 which the subject has been most carefully studied 

 shows that there may be occasional errors. Indeed 

 the witnesses themselves recognized that absolutely 

 accurate figures were not obtainable. 



" We are far from denying that isolated cases may 

 have been due to contaminated shellfish, but we must 

 remember that the possibility of some of them being 

 due to other causes cannot be altogether excluded." 



In the above-mentioned cases, where oysters have 

 been proven or reasonably suspected of being the cause 

 of disease, it was found that the oysters in ques- 

 tion had been floated or grown in heavily polluted 

 water where direct contact with specific infection 

 could be proven or readily assumed. The Wesleyan 

 epidemic is a case in point. Oysters had undoubtedly 

 been floated in the contaminated waters at Fair Haven 

 for a number of years previous to 1894 without any 

 noticeable effect on the health of persons eating them, 

 but specific infection of the water from two patients 

 in a house near by was followed by a serious epidemic. 



