STATE HYGIENE 475 



the difSculties in diagnosis that some cases present, but no 

 difficulties can ever arise with the ignorant ! 



Swine Fever can never be exterminated by the Board so 

 long as it works with laymen, and this lesson it has taken 

 them many years to learn ; the money spent on compensa- 

 tion* might, so far as getting rid of the disease is concerned, 

 have been put into the sea. This the authorities are them- 

 selves realizing, for destructions are greatly reduced, and 

 consequently compensation not given. 



The country can make up its mind that in veterinary 

 as in other matters the trained man is always immeasurably 

 superior to the amateur, and that no effective veterinary 

 service can exist in which the prime movers in the machine 

 are laymen. It is difficult to see where the economy comes 

 in of losing hundreds of thousands of pounds on an out- 

 break of disease, and starving the veterinary service by 

 giving it laymen to work with instead of the expert. 



The Eoyal Commission on Tuberculosis was astonished 

 to find that the meat inspectors of this country consisted of 

 conductors of the tramway, carpenters, plumbers, stone- 

 masons, bricklayers, florists, printers, and school teachers ! 

 What would a Eoyal Commission think if a pubHc enquiry 

 revealed the fact that the most important measures for the 

 suppression of animal diseases in this country were left to 

 the judgment of men equally as ignorant of the matter as 

 the above ! The failure to eradicate swine fever would at 

 any rate be explained. 



In no other country would such a constitution be tolerated. 

 Ireland, with special powers to employ laymen, rightly 

 refuses to have them. 



Some of the best veterinary advice and ability in Europe 

 is available for the Board of Agriculture, but instead of 

 exclusively employing it, they choose men without special- 

 ized knowledge or training, even to the extent of furnishing 

 a Parliamentary Eeport on Animal Diseases ! 



Weak Points in the 'Act' and Orders of the Board of 

 Acjriculture.—We shall presently examine the Act of 

 * It spent ^600,000 between 1893 and 1902 1 



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