THE SANITARY FACTORS 89 



welfare station. With reliable infants' milk well recog- 

 nized in the market, station distribution and home 

 pasteurization would be largely unnecessary; the en- 

 ergies of the station nurses would then be concen- 

 trated, so far as milk is concerned, on teaching the home 

 care and preparation of milk, while station prepara- 

 tion would still be possible if and where deemed neces- 

 sary. It must be said, however, that at the present 

 time milk stations are often the only thing that 

 stands between the baby and the dangers of ordinary 

 milk. 



LABORATORY TESTS AND STANDARDS 

 I. CHEMICAL 



The earliest milk standards adopted were chemical. 

 Such standards relate to the general composition of 

 milk, and inasmuch as this in nature varies very con- 

 siderably, there has been no exact agreement in the 

 standards set by various authorities. The United 

 States official standard may be taken as representative: 

 this requires 12 per cent total solids, 8.5 per cent solids 

 not fat, and 3.25 per cent fat. A standard of 9.25 per 

 cent total solids is prescribed for skimmed milk. Stand- 

 ards set by the various States and cities * vary some- 

 what from the above and may even establish separate 

 figures for winter and for summer. It must not be 

 thought that milk which is barely " standard " accord- 

 ing to these figures is the ideal; they merely represent 



* The U. S. Department of Agriculture has recently issued a sum- 

 mary of these. 



