174 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



my office of the stomach troubles all over New York City. 

 No reports came in at all. At the end of the fifth day, I 

 thought to myself that I might be unpopular with the doctor 

 if he heard there was diphtheria up there, so I called him up 

 and said, "We have got diphtheria among our dairy farmers; 

 what shall we do?" He was very much excited, and said, 

 "I guess you will have to pasteurize that milk." I said, 

 "Won't that upset the babies?" He said, "Yes, but the doctors 

 and nurses will have to take precautions in order to tide them 

 over this change." I said, "Doctor, you have been getting 

 pasteurized milk for five days at all these stations." None of 

 the babies noticed it, none of them, and I will tell you why. 

 Pasteurization to-day is very different from what it used to be. 

 We are using low temperatures; we are heating up to only 145 

 degrees. In the old days they used to heat up to 158 or 165, 

 and the milk used to be altered somewhat in its composition. 

 To-day the chemist cannot find any alteration; at 145 degrees 

 it is just hot enough to coagulate the bacteria substance and 

 destroy the life and the vitality of these germs. That was 

 four years ago, and since that time the pasteurizer has never 

 been turned off. We have got 55 stores and a doctor and 

 nurse attached to each one, and overhead supervision by 

 supervising doctors and nurses, and the whole crowd were 

 against pasteurization at first. Now they are all unanimously 

 in favor of it, and why? They cannot find rickets, they cannot 

 find scurvy; they find a constant increase in the weight, and 

 more than all, the death rate in babies has gone down from 

 137 five years ago to 94 per thousand of all babies born. 



Mr. BixBY. I would like to ask how we are going to be 

 sure that that pasteurization is done right. 



Dr. North. That is a matter that takes its place along 

 with any other guarantee that you get by legislation or public 

 health supervision in Massachusetts. You have got to put 

 this matter in the hands of reliable people, and I take it for 

 granted you have such people up here. We think we have 

 reliable supervision in New York City of our pasteurization. 

 The law of the board of health defines pasteurization very 

 clearly and definitely. They have automatic machines in all 

 the pasteurizing plants, which record the temperature and the 



