Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1916-03-29

"All the recent work done in the
biochemical laboratories of the Liver
pool School of Tropical Medicine
proves beyond question that in all ce-
reals, such as wheat, barley, oats and
rice, there are series of important
substances incorporated in the inner
layer of the husi which are essential
TO the nutritive value of tn grain"
These are the words of DR.. Benjamin
Moore, chief of the bio-chemical de-
partment of that institution.
IF these elements are eliminated
in the milling or preparation of the
grain, a diet largely composed of ce-
reals or bread thus denatured will not
only fail adequately to nourish the
body but will tend to set up active
disease.
Certain OF the diseases of malnu-
triton among children, notably rick
cts, sourvy-rickets, tetany and con-
vulsions. present symptoms very sim
liar to those we note in our white
bread pigeons. So striking is this sim
ilarity that hpsyicians who have fol-
lowed up our work are already treat
ing certain of their malnutrition pa
tients with a diet of whole wheat
bread.
"Our nerves as a nation are much
less stable than in the days prior to
white bread diet. All our work sug-
gests that the growing tendency of
the age TO neurasthenia, nerves. etc.
is not unlikely due to removing from
our diet those very elements of cereal
food which nature has hid in the
husk of the grain, and which man
in his ignorance discards."
special meeting of the British As
sociation and the Health Congress of
the Royal Institute of Public Health
was called at Portsmouth to consider
the results of the work done by Hop
kins, Eddie, Simpson, and Moore. Lit
tie has come of this work for the
reasons that the discussions usually
take the form of ponderous scientific
data and the people learn nothing of
them.
Prior TO the Investigations of these
British scientists an extensive re-
search into the same subject had been
conducted in France. Armand Gau-
tier, internationally eminent, had eX-
plored the entire field of nutrition, in
spring numerous other French scien-
lists to undertake work of similar ma
ture.
All of them have arrived at one
conclusion. which is briefly this. Man
has lost the instinct of nourishing
himself. The lower animals, when left
to themselves, have an innate knowl-
edge of the proper food, but it is
necessary that mankind be instructed
III ii GtIldlli dlilOunl Oh SClenIlIC knOWl-
edge in other that n health h-sustain-
ing and disease-resisting diet may be
selected.
Just one week before the grim day
in which France became involved in
the conflagration that spread over the
nations of Europe in 1914, little
group OF French scientists, inspired
solely by good will toward man, and
with no thought of the calamity which
was so shortly to overtake the world,
gave to humanity the results of their
experimental research into the dam
gers of feeding with refined cereals
Their conclusions We're published in
the Paris Medical, July %. 1914. Born
as they were in the agonies of a
regin of destruction and death they
possess peculiar significance to the
people of the United States, who, a
few weeks later, were advised by
various uplift committees, seeking to
solve the problem of war prices, to
turn away from wheat and wheat
flour and consume rice, rye, barley,
corn. and oats instead.
L. WE'LL and G. Mouriauand were