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New Zealand Listener, Volume 29, Issue 743, 9 October 1953, Page 5

Sir,-On glancing through your issue of September 18 I came upon a letter signed by "R.W." (Blenheim), dealing with pasteurised milk. In this letter it is stated that "Experiments at some Barnatrdo Homes in England have proved that raw milk and not pasteurised js far more beneficial." This statement is incorrect, as the following, taken from a letter dated September 8, 1952, received from the Chief Medical Officer of Dr. "Barnardo’s Homes (Dr, H, C. Gilmore) will show: My predecessor in this office, from which he retired in 1941, was a strong believer in the value of ‘‘clean’’ raw milk, and wrote an article’ to the press some time during 1936. I have never been able to trace the original, and the first concrete reference I have is a clipping from a journal called Farmer and Stockbreeder, of January 12, 1937. From that date onward, recurring references to it have been made in a wide variety of journals all over the world, and from time to time I still get letters, although it is now more than 16 years since the original appeared, Towards the end of 1942 there was a sharp recrudescence of correspondence on the question of pasteurisation in quite a number of journals in this country, and a very strongly worded leading article in. the British Medical Journal appeared in their issue of December 19, 1942. In view of the great publicity afforded to the views of my ‘predecessor at that time, I wrote a brief letter to the British Medical Journal, pointing out that the Council of Dr. Barnardo’s Homes did not subseribe to his views and that. ‘in fact; while he was still chief medical officer, they had ‘in December, 1938, ordered the eral use of pasteurised milk throughout the homes.

D. P.

KENNEDY

Medical Officer of Health, Christchurch.

(ihis correspondence is now closed.--Ed.)