THE RELATIONSHIP OF FOOD TO PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT. 1 



By D. McCat. 2 



"It is food that supplies the material for that perpetual series of 

 transformations in which life consists, and it must be adequate in 

 quantity and suitable in quality if these transformations, of so many 

 different kinds, in so many different organs, are to proceed with that 

 nicely balanced adjustment that is known as health." 3 



The question of the proper amount of daily food necessary to meet 

 the physiological needs of the body is one that has occupied the atten- 

 tion of a great many workers since Chittenden stirred the nutritional 

 pool. Believing that light would be thrown on the problem by a knowl- 

 edge of the conditions that obtained in India, a series of investigations 

 was undertaken to ascertain, if possible, the nutritive value of the dif- 

 ferent types of diet on which the teeming millions of India live. The 

 inquiry soon resolved itself into one of determining the levels of nitrog- 

 enous metabolism attained on the different dietaries, and their effects 

 on the physical development and well-being of the races investigated. 



The dietaries being largely of a vegetable nature there is always an 

 abundance of the carbohydrate element and a sufficiency of fat. 



The first observations were made on students and others belonging 

 to the Medical College, Calcutta, and also on some prisoners in the 

 presidency jail. It was found that the average native of Lower Bengal 

 on the ordinary diet of the province, namely, rice and dal, attains even 

 a lower level of nitrogenous metabolism than Chittenden found to be 

 quite compatible with health, bodily comfort, and the maintenance of 

 strength and vigor. The observations made showed that students and 

 members of the fairly well-to-do classes exist on a metabolism of less 

 than 40 grams of protein per man daily. The great mass of the popula- 

 tion is on an even lower scale than this. These results bore out Chit- 

 tenden's views as regards the possibility of man existing on a protein 

 content of the general diet less than one-third that of the ordinary 



1 Read at the First Biennial Meeting of the Far Eastern Association of Tropical 

 Medicine held at Manila March 14, 1910. 



! Captain I. M. S., Professor of Physiology, Medical College of Bengal, Calcutta. 

 3 Sir J. Crichton-Browne. 



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