The Miller press. [volume] (Miller, S.D.) 190?-current, 1907-08-15
HEALTH BOARD
ON PURE FOODS
Health Department Says Towns
and Cities Should Control
Slaughter Houses

The following circular, has just
been sent out by the Iowa State
Board Of Health:
Pure food and inspection of
articles and places for their prepar-
alton or manufacture, is an import
ant branch of sanitary science, and
properly belongs to the department
authorized and organized to safe
guard the public health. The law
enacted by the 31st General Assemb-
ly should be looked upon simply as
beginning. The provisions Of the
present law fail to compass the most
important features Of the subject, in
that it deals with the chemical and
quantitative aspect of the question
to the exclusion of the sanitary fea-
lures.
While it is not our intention to
underestimate the serious conse-
quence sometimes resulting from the
use of adulterated articles of food of
the need for stringent prohibiting
regulations, we contend that this is
an evil of but small proportions when
compared to the loathsome and dis
gusting conditions pretaining to the
preparation and quality Of the meat
aud milk supply, and that far more
disastrous results are produced
through consumption of diseased or
contaminated animal commodities,
than from chemical adulterations.
The federal meat inspection law
now being rigidly enforced at all
packing houses engaged in foreign
or Interstate commerce, if unsup-
ported by state or local restrictions,
may prove a boomerang loaded with
destruction to the very communities
raising and supplying the choicest
live stock in the world. Since the
new Federal regulations have been
put in force, the cattle buyers at all
of the large centers of the packing
industry have refused to pay for
cattle until after slaughter and in.
spection by the Government Inspec-
tors. If the carcass is declared by
these officials to be diseased or other
wise unfit for consumption as food
it is sent to the rendering tank to be
manufactured into fertilizer, and the
shipper is required to stand the loss.
AS result, there is now large de-
crease in the receipts of so-called
Gamers, at the various stock
yards, local shippers finding it more
profitable to dispose of these to the
local butcher at home. Hence, the
people of Iowa who by rights are en-
titled to the best and choicest of
meats, are compelled to live upon
the carcasses of old worn out cows,
unthrifty calves, cattle and hogs in
advanced stages of tuberculosis, and
occasionally a choice steak from a
fat steer suffering with actinomyco-
sis dump jaw
There is indeed urgent need for
general inspection Of all animal pro-
ducts, of the places where such arti-
cles are prepared and Kept for sale,
and of the persons employed in hand
ling them Such inspection, to be
reliable and complete, must extend
to the very door of the actual con-
sumer, and should include butcher
shops, slaughter houses, bakeries.
dairies, hotels and restaurants.
Under Section 1858 of the Code,
Local Boards of Health are clothed
with authority to make such regu-
lations as are necessary for the pro-
lection of the public health respect
ing nuisances, sources Of filth. causes
of sickness, rabid animal, and quar-
antine, not in conflict with any regu-
lations of the State Board of Health.
CTATE EVA MIC