No. 4.] CATTLE COMMISSIONERS' REPORT. 400 



with tuberculosis, is a matter worthy of the attention of your 

 honorable body. 



So far as this Board is aware, the only restrictions placed 

 upon the sale of milk are those in connection with its being up 

 to a certain standard in quality. This matter is entirely within 

 the control of the boards of health, and the Board of Cattle 

 Commissioners have nothing to do with it. There is no law in 

 this State regulating; the sale of milk from tuberculous ani- 

 mals, and no steps have been taken heretofore by the State to 

 test milk sold in the markets for the purposes of ascertaining 

 whether it contains the germs of tuberculosis ; that such milk, 

 derived from a tuberculous cow, may contain such germs, has 

 been demonstrated beyond question ; and that it thus may be a 

 source of danger to the public health is equally true. 



As a practical question, it is extremely difficult to ascertain 

 surely in an}' given specimen of milk whether or not the bacilli 

 are present. There are two methods used for testing milk for 

 these germs, — one a microscopic examination of the milk, the 

 other the inoculation of other animals, usually guinea pigs, with 

 specimens of the milk, to see whether they will develop the 

 disorder. It is impossible to test the milk of this State, in any 

 appreciable quantity in comparison with the daily consumption, 

 in either of these ways ; and the only practical method of assur- 

 ing the delivery of milk that is free from tuberculosis is to go 

 to the fountain head of the matter, and see that the cows from 

 which the milk is derived are themselves free from disease. 



As this commission has no control over the cattle without the 

 limits of the Commonwealth, it naturally follows that, as the law 

 is to-day, it can only purify that portion of the milk supply 

 which is derived from the cows within the limits of the Com- 

 monwealth ; and there is, therefore, a great deal of justice in 

 the complaint that, while the dairymen of this State are sub- 

 jected to a rigorous inspection of their cattle, which will in the 

 end insure the production of milk that is free from the germs 

 of tuberculosis, it is also true that large quantities of milk is 

 being sold in this State from cows over which the State has no 

 control, because they are kept outside its limits, and which are 

 as likelv to be tuberculous as are the cows of ^Massachusetts. 



If the work of the commission is to continue, as it is now 

 carried on, it may be said that it is not unlikely that the milk 

 brought from without the limits of the State will be even more 



