Greymouth Evening Star. AND BRUNNERTON ADVOCATE FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 1901. RIDICULOUS PRECAUTIONS.

Greymouth Evening Star, Volume XXXI, 8 November 1901, Page 2

Greymouth Evening Star. AND BRUNNERTON ADVOCATE FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 1901. RIDICULOUS PRECAUTIONS.

Dr Mason, the chief health officer, like all " new brooms," is inclined to sweep all dust and cobwebs away at one brush. Yesterday we gave pretty fully his comments on sewage and water supp-y—remarks that are generally recognised as containing much truth, and will doubtless command close attention. He next directs his attention to the meat question. As the slaughtering and inspection of meat is now under the direct control

of the Agricultural Department, 'which he presumes will do its duty, he has little to*remark thereon, but the subsequent treatment of meat by retailers comes in for considerable notice. He regards the present mode of exposing and selling as dangerous to public health. He says there is one phase of the question that requires attention, namely—the conservation and care of the meat -when it is passed from the slaughterhouse to the butcher's shop. " Were the retailers of any other diet, he says, to expose their wares in the way in which the butchers, large as well as small, do, there would at once be a great outcry. Take, then, the best shops that we see in any of our large towns. The meat is exposed to every wind which blows, and to every particle of dust that'is carried by that

wind. There is no question, whatever, but that disease can be spread in such a way, and I feel it my duty to draw your attention to this most important matter. To remedy this should not be a difficult problem. The meat could be enclosed between two layers of glass, which space could be properly .-crated by means of a fan. The meat would in this way be protected completely from contamination by the hundred and one forms of filth, which are blown about in every large town, while the appeal to the customers' eye wou'd still be as strong as it is now, and far more pleasing would be their reflections." We quite agree that it is essential to take proper steps for the preservation of health, but it is just possible to get so particular as to preclude man taking any food for fear that he may unconsciously take into his stomach with such food a dozen or more of the minute " particle of animal life" that are so harmful to the human form. We presume we must take these risks or die of starvation, and even fear that there is in Dr. Mason's " Novelty Glass Meat Chamber, with fan attached" still a danger that the fan in working may blow on to the meat some of the " one hundred and one forms of filth " referred to. If we take ordinary precautions, that is all that should be required. If we go too far we render man like a hot-house plant delicate and more apt t) catch disease than before. We only require to go a trifle further and show that man must not walk on the public street, not inhale the air because of the hundred and one particles of dust and disease to be met with.