EFFECTS OF PORK-CURING PROCESSES ON TRICHINZ. 5 
animals were killed a month to six months after feeding and the 
meat from their carcasses used m making sausages, hams, and 
other products. The viability of the trichine in each carcass was 
tested by feeding some of the uncured meat to experimental animals. 
The uncured meat was kept in a refrigerator and was usually not 
tested for the presence of viable trichine until the close of the experi- 
ments on the products made from the remainder of the carcass. In 
some cases this special test of viability was aot necessary because 
the trichine in the products made from the respective carcasses 
were found to have survived the processes to which the products 
were subjected in their preparation. In all cases the trichine in 
the uncured meat from carcasses used in the experiments were 
found to be alive and capable of producing heavy infestations in 
rats or other experimental animals, so there is no question as to the 
infectivity of the meat used in making the experimental products. 
The usual method of testing the viability of the trichine in tne 
cured products was to take portions of some of the pieces of the 
finished product and feed them to rats or mice in the laboratory 
of the establishment in which the experimental product was prepared, 
generally feeding the anima!s during a period of six or seven days 
in succession with ail of the sausage, ham, or other product they 
would eat. At the first feeding the unwashed product was fed, 
but the feedings on tne followmg days were made with some of the 
product which at the termination of the curing or drying process 
was ground up in a meat chopper and thoroughly washed with 
water to remove the salt. In this way further action of the salt in 
the product was promptly stopped at the close of the experiment. 
At least three rats or mice were thus fed in each experiment, and 
commonly two or three lots of rats and mice were fed, using different 
pieces of the same experimental product for the different lots of 
animals. : 
The post-mortem examinations of all the test rats and mice fed 
in Chicago were made by one of the writers (Raffensperger) or in 
his presence b) members of the laboratory staffs of the meat-packing 
establishments in which the experimenta! products were prepared. 
In some cases test animals were fed not only at the establishment 
laboratories but also at the Chicago laboratory of the bureau, and 
in nearly all cases test animals were also fed at the Washington 
laboratory, some of the pieces of the product from each experiment 
peing shipped to Washington for the purpose. 
In many of the experiments there was also shipped to Washington 
for testing some of the product that had been ground up and washed 
to stop further salt action. The procedure followed in the Wasb- 
ington laboratory consisted in taking portions from the several 
pieces of product belonging to a single experiment as soon as possible 
