DISEASED MEAT AS FOOD FOR HUMAN CONSUMPTION. 127 
DISEASED MEAT AS FOOD FOR HUMAN CONSUMPTION, 
By Dr. M. Wilson, Mendota, Illinois. 
(A Paper read before the Illinois State Veterinary Medical Association). 
The subject of my paper, “ Diseased meat as food for 
human consumption,” is not only a broad one, but one on 
which many different opinions are held, and one of which, 
for obvious reasons, not very much can be definitely stated. 
It is not my intention to take every disease and show, as re¬ 
gards the affected flesh, its fitness or unfitness for human 
food, but to confine myself to one or two of the more impor¬ 
tant specific diseases. 
As science progresses more light is constantly being 
thrown on the origin, cause and nature of these diseases, from 
which deductions are constantly being made regarding their 
fitness for human food, and ways and means devised for their 
treatment or eradication. The similarity of many diseases 
affecting man and those affecting animals has led to investi¬ 
gations, which have resulted not only in proving them anal- 
agous, but in preventing their spread from one to the other 
by quarantining and prohibiting the use of any medium of 
infection, such as the milk and flesh. 
The dangerous role that the meat of diseased animals 
plays in causing disease amongst its consumers was suspect¬ 
ed, if not actually proved, centuries ago by the Jewish rab¬ 
bis. They laid down a strict code of inspection, by especially 
qualified persons, of the bodies of animals permitted for con¬ 
sumption ; the rule of this code being still observed at the 
present time among the orthodox sects of the Jews in many 
countries. In this code certain definite disorders are men¬ 
tioned in great detail, some of which can, without difficulty, 
be identified under more modern names. The directions are 
so minute and clear that any one without much knowledge 
of anatomy or pathology, can, on examining the viscera of 
the animal, detect the disease. 
According to that code, the body'of an animal showing on 
inspection disease of one kind or another in the viscera is un- 
