1026 FOODS AND FOOD ADULTERANTS. 



Lead is extremely poisonous, and tin is also poisonous, though in a 

 much less degree. As to the preservatives in common use, of which 

 salicylic acid may be taken as a type, and the salts of copper and zinc, 

 their toxic action is not yet definitely known. This much is certain, 

 however, that they have a marked physiological action and are all of 

 them more or less potent medically. In large quantities they create 

 very evident symptoms of poisoning, though this is usually only tem- 

 porary. In the quantities in which they are liable to occur in canned 

 foods, their action is at the best uncertain. They may be innocuous 

 they may not be. Much evidence can be collected to prove either side 

 of the question. It is a question which science is not yet prepared to 

 settle. Pending that settlement, however, it may be said that their 

 use is to be reprobated, inasmuch as any benefit which may be derived 

 by the canner from their presence he can secure in other and less dubi- 

 ous ways. At the very least any food which contains them should be 

 clearly and distinctly labeled, with the fact expressed in direct lan- 

 guage. Where this is not done, their presence should be cowsideredto 

 be an adulteration and punished as such. 



If there is any fact which is clearer than another, it is that no man 

 or set of men has any right to administer surreptitiously to any other 

 man a more or less potent drug. Every man has a right to knowledge 

 of the fact of being drugged, unless he expressly waives this right in 

 favor of a physician. Even here the law steps in and prescribes that 

 this physician shall be a member of a recognized school. This the cau- 

 ners seldom are. Salicylic acid, which may be taken as a type of these 

 additions, for instance, is a valued medicine in many cases, is in fact 

 one of the best known remedies for rheumatism, and is believed never 

 to have caused death in any dose. 1 But this is no justification for its 

 use. It is certain that it disturbs the normal course of the bodily func- 

 tions it must of necessity do so to have medical value and this fact is 

 alone enough to demand its exclusion from any food intended for gen- 

 eral use, unless the food be so labeled. 



There is another thing which may be said on this point. Were it as 

 harmless as distilled water, there would be no excuse for its addition to 

 food without notification to the consumer. Salicylic acid is not a nor- 

 mal constituent of any common food, and its addition to such foods for 

 any purpose and in any quantity, without due notice to the consumer, 

 is plainly adulteration. If any man desires to have salicylic acid in his 

 food there is no doubt of his right to have it, since it is not a sufficiently 

 violent poison to warrant the Government's forbidding him. But there 

 is also no doubt of the fact that the canner has no right to admix it 



1 There are several cases on record of death supposed to have been due to this sub- 

 stance, notably tint one reported in the. Virginia Medical Monthly, June, 1877, whore 

 death followed the taking of 3 grams, divided into several doses, within a period of 

 forty hours after the first dose. All these cases, however, are at the best doubtful, for 

 m HUM instances the patient has had enough the matter \\ ith him to have killed 

 him anyhow. 



