THURSDAY, DECEMBER 13, 1906. 
THE USE OF PRESERVATIVES. 
Preservatives in Food and Food Examination. By Dr. 
John C. Thresh and Dr. A. E. Porter. Pp. xvi+ 484. 
(London: J. and A. Churchill, 1906.) Price 14s. net. 
HERE is much knowledge enshrined in Parlia- 
mentary Blue-books, and doubtless some wisdom. 
Very often it remains enshrined in them. A better 
fate, however, has awaited the report of the Depart- 
mental Committee appointed by the President of the 
Local Government Board in 1899 “ to inquire into the 
use of preservatives and. colouring-matters in food- 
stuffs.’” Messrs. Thresh and Porter have taken this 
report partly as text, partly as sermon; amplify- 
ing it here, compressing it there, and adding, more- 
over, various allied matters not directly within the pur- 
view of the committee, they have produced a volume 
which will probably be consulted by hygienists when 
the original Blue-book lies almost forgotten in the 
archives of the Parliamentary bookseller. 
The matter is classified into five parts. In the first 
section the authors deal with the various methods 
adopted for preserving foods, and give a general de- 
scription of preservatives, their pharmacological effects, 
and the experimental work which has been done upon 
them. For example, Wiley’s investigation into the 
effects of boron compounds upon the human system is 
summarised, together with Liebreich’s criticism of the 
results, and due note is made of important experiments 
by many other workers, including Chittenden, Rideal 
and Foulerton, Annett, and Tunnicliffe and Rosenheim. 
The second part is devoted to the principal foodstuffs 
into which preservatives enter, namely, milk, cream, 
butter, alcoholic and temperance beverages, fruits, 
vegetables, meat, eggs, and fish. Based upon inform- 
ation contained in the Departmental Committee’s re- 
port, a short account of the substances is given, with 
figures showing the quantities of preservative used, 
and notes of the various circumstances affecting its 
employment. 
A perusal of these two sections suggests strongly 
that the present state of affairs is by no means satis- 
factory as regards the use of chemical preservatives. 
Our policy has been a haphazard one. Preservatives 
of some kind—e.g. salt and vinegar—have been em- 
ployed as far back as the memory of man carries us. 
The question is asked, Are these long-known sub- 
stances the best possible for the purpose? Is it not 
conceivable that modern chemistry might find some- 
thing better? Quite possibly it may; in fact so far as 
indicating antiseptics and germicides is concerned, the 
task is easy. But there is the further question how 
far any substance which is destructive of microbial and 
parasitical forms of life may also be inimical to the 
human organism. It is a question of quantity. On the 
one hand we have the advocates of various preserving 
substances—borice acid, formaldehyde, hydrogen per- 
oxide, sodium fluoride; salicylic, benzoic, formic, and 
sulphurous acids; asaprol, and so on—who argue (1) 
that by the use of these and other means of preservation 
NO woe 7, VOL.,.7.5)| 
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145 
food is rendered cheaper ; (2) that definite cases of illness 
or death have rarely or never been conclusively traced 
to the use of preservatives; and (3) that, on the con- 
trary, during recent years the death-rate has declined, 
one of the assignable causes of this being the better 
feeding of the people resulting from cheaper food. On 
the other hand, it is urged that many cases of illness 
have, in fact, been indicated as probably due to pre- 
servatives. At the best these latter have not been proved 
harmless, and the most we can admit is that we really 
do not know what are the physiological effecis of 
small amounts of the foregoing substances. But they 
are certainly harmful if taken in quantity, and may be 
so in any dose which would be effective as a germicide. 
Moreover, even if strong and healthy adults are un- 
harmed by them, there are still children and invalids to 
consider. Again, it has been pointed out that the un- 
controlled employment of preservatives is sometimes 
liable to great abuse without culpable carelessness on 
the part of any individual user. Boric acid, for example, 
may be added to milk first by the farmer, again by the 
wholesale distributer, then by one or more retailers, 
and possibly again by the consumer himself; and each 
may add the maximum allowable quantity. Generally, 
it may be said that we rarely or never know how 
much preservative any given food either ought to con- 
tain or does actually contain. 
The policy of our laws has been to allow food-pro- 
ducers a free hand, subject to the restriction that any 
preservative added shall not render the food injurious 
to health. But has this laissez faire attitude been a 
wise one? ‘True, it leaves the food manufacturer free 
to experiment—which is, so far, good. But it gives 
him the consumer’s living body as corpus vile—which 
is not so good. 
Naturally the consumer has some right of objection, 
and in any case the question of what is “‘ injurious to 
health ’’ has always to be fought out in the police court 
—about the worst place in which to decide such a 
matter. The most diverse decisions have been arrived 
at, and meanwhile the query whether or not we and 
our children are being caused unnecessary suffering 
remains unanswered. 
What would be the ideal way of treating such a 
problem if we could start afresh, and impose decrees 
modo tyranni? Surely it would be to say :—Let your 
salt, vinegar, and such like, as having by long usage 
proved themselves comparatively harmless, remain as 
they are. Let a responsible body be appointed, com- 
petent to examine the newer substances; let it hear 
what is to be said on either side, and let it make 
whatever experiments may be necessary and practicable 
to test the evidence. And let no preservative or colour-~ 
ing-matter whatever be added to foodstuffs until it has 
been at least provisionally approved by this responsible 
authority. 
If this course is not practicable in its entirety now 
that a number of more or less dubious substances have 
gained something of a footing, it is at least possible 
to a very considerable extent. The authors of the 
volume before us give both sides of the question very 
fairly—so fairly indeed that we are often reminded of 
Mr. Facing-both-ways. But the impression left by a 
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