SEA-FISHERIES LABORATORY. 87 



cannot be overlooked, but it can greatly be exaggerated. It 

 is probable that entire exclusion of mussels from the public 

 markets would not greatly reduce the incidence of enteric fever, 

 while it is also possible that a very highly perfected system 

 • of public sanitation, in the widest sense, might reduce typhoid 

 to the status of typhus without interfering greatly with the 

 use of shellfish as human food. 



The Administrative Procedure with regard to Contamined 

 Shellfish. 



The above discussion will throw some light on the utility 

 of the present administrative methods ; these date back only 

 to 1915, when the Local Government Board made the " Shellfish 

 Regulations," under which action with regard to polluted 

 mussels is now taken. Prior to 1915 little or nothing was done. 

 Various Health Authorities were able to exclude mussels from 

 the public markets under their control, and, apparently, they 

 based their action on the inspectorial work done by their own 

 officials (that is, they moved on the kind of evidence furnished 

 by the quoted cases on pp. 82-83), or they took action on 

 inspections made, and bacteriological analyses procured by 

 the Fishmongers' Company of London. Obviously they could 

 only exclude mussels from the public markets, but could not, 

 in general, prevent the sale of the shellfish by hawkers, or in 

 retail fish shops. Attention was drawn to the matter, but 

 it is not certain that much more than that happened. There 

 was no closure of the polluted shellfish beds prior to 1915 

 because no public authority possessed this power. 



The " Shellfish Regulations " conferred this power on the 

 Local Health Authorities, and the Central Authority is now the 

 Ministry of Health. The procedure is interesting : if the 

 local Medical Officer of Health " is in possession of information 

 that any person is suffering, or recently has suffered, from 

 infectious or other disease attributable to shellfish, or that 



