January 30, 1914] 



SCIENCE 



183 



of raw pork products, though, perhaps, on the 

 other hand, it would tend to encourage the 

 custom of eating raw pork among those per- 

 sons who knew of the existence of a trichina 

 inspection and of its purpose, and thus the 

 good the inspection did in one way would be 

 largely offset by the evil it did in another. 

 The protection afforded by such an inspection 

 would of course apply only to those pork pro- 

 ducts prepared under federal supervision and 

 would not extend to products prepared in local 

 establishments, or in private homes, even 

 though the pork used came from animals 

 slaughtered in inspected establishments, inas- 

 much as the special inspection for trichinae 

 would be given only to those hogs which were 

 expressly intended to be used in the prepara- 

 tion of products of kinds customarily eaten 

 raw. Nor would such an inspection afford 

 any protection from the danger of contract- 

 ing trichinosis through imperfectly cooked 

 pork, as hogs not intended to be manufactured 

 into products customarily eaten raw would not 

 be inspected for trichinae. The partial inspec- 

 tion in question, however, would cover the 

 class of pork which seems particularly likely to 

 be the most fertile source of trichinosis in so 

 far as meats originating from establishments 

 under federal inspection are concerned, and 

 the consumer of raw pork products would thus 

 be protected in large measure so long as he 

 limited himself to those products specially 

 labeled as inspected for trichiuEe. 



The results of the experiments recorded in 

 this article naturally suggest the possibility of 

 substituting refrigeration for microscopic 

 inspection as a prophylactic measure. It is 

 perhaps rather venturesome to express an 

 opinion at the present time as to the extent 

 to which refrigeration might be used prac- 

 tically as a preventive of trichinosis, but, if it 

 be granted that it is desirable to institute 

 measures which will serve to protect the con- 

 eumer of raw pork products, leaving out of 

 consideration the question of a general micro- 

 scopic inspection of all hogs slaughtered, it 

 seems to the writer, in view of the defects in- 

 herent in microscopic inspection even at its 

 best, that refrigeration (provided the data at 



present in hand are confirmed by further inves- 

 tigation) promises to afford a means of pre- 

 venting trichinosis of far greater certainty, 

 easier to apply, and less expensive than any 

 method of trichina inspection yet devised. 

 Instead of a microscopic inspection of the hogs 

 from which raw pork products were to be pre- 

 pared there would be required simply the 

 refrigeration of the pork at a certain tempera- 

 ture for a certain length of time. It is pos- 

 sible, considering that the refrigeration of 

 foods is becoming more and more general, 

 keeping pace with the development of im- 

 proved and more economical methods, that 

 sooner or later the general refrigeration of 

 pork, without reference to whether it is to be 

 eaten raw or cooked, may become desirable 

 and feasible as a prophylactic measure against 

 trichinosis. For the present, however, it is 

 probable that the use of refrigeration for this 

 purpose is likely to have only a more limited 

 application such as that which has been sug- 

 gested, leaving for future development its pos- 

 sible further extension, all of which is of 

 course contingent primarily upon the confirma- 

 tion of the results of the experimental work 

 recorded in this paper, and secondarily upon 

 various other things, such as the effects of 

 refrigeration upon the meat and the expense 

 involved in the artificial production of cold. 



Further investigation of this interesting 

 question of the effect of cold upon trichinae is 

 in progress, and it is hoped that conclusive 

 data as to the exact temperatures and time 

 required to render trichinous meat innocuous 

 will be available at an early date. 



B. H. Kansom 

 Bureau of Animal Industry, 

 U. S. Department of Agriculture, 

 Washington, D. C. 

 November 22, 1913 



THE AMEBICAN FSTSIOLOGICAL SOCIETY 

 The 26th annual meeting of the American Physi- 

 ological Society was held at the University of 

 Pennsylvania and at the Jefferson Medical School, 

 Philadelphia, December 28-31, 1913. One hun- 

 dred and eighteen of the members of the society 

 were present at the meeting. This, I think, was 



