THE TUBERCULOSIS PROBLEM.

Evening Post, Volume LVII, Issue 25, 31 January 1899, Page 4

THE TUBERCULOSIS PROBLEM.

The public mind is naturally- agitated in the lafge centres of population about the sale of tuberculous meat and milk. The uneasiness felt will not be banished until a thoroughly efficient system of inspection i» generally adopted. Official efforts to stamp out the disease, in this as well as in other parts of the world, have shown almost conclusively that the coat i is greater than the community can bear, and that, even if the heavy cost be incurred, it is doubtful whether tuberculosis can be eradicated from stock so long as it exists among other living creatures. At any rate, the practical issue seems now to be narrowed down to one of mitigation. As we pointed out in a previous article, much could be' done by isolating cattle reacting to the, tuberculin test, only slaughtering those which showed outward signs of disease, or were manifestly dangerous to the public from having tuberculous udders, or. being /po riddled with tubercles as to make their flesh unwholesome. We are glad to observe from* a communication recently made by Mr. J. D. Ritchie to the representative of a Southern newspaper that the Agricultural t)eparbment has .come., round to this view. Perhaps the prospect of the State's having to pay compensation to the owners of slaughtered stocK has' Opened official eyes to the magnitude of the losses that would result from slaughtering all.beasts reacting to the test. Ii the Department adopts a careful and consistent policy of mitigation the public should be successfully secured against acquiring tuberculosis (through the ingestion of meat or milk, and a due respect should be shown to the pockets of stockowners and taxpayers, not to mention to the progress of our pastoral industries. It is, however, of the utmost importance that inspection should be careful and constant. Because isolation is substituted for slaughtering in a large number of cases, there will be greater need of expert knowledge and wise discretion on the part of inspectors. The Government is now advertising in the Home papers for six qualified cattle inspectors, presumably veterinary surgeons, and this looks as though the Department were earnestly striving to cope with the disease. The Dairy Regulations Committee of this district has also decided to request the Government to appoint ( a qualified veterinary surgeon to the position of local inspector in place of Mr. George Collier. Mr. Collier has, we doubt not, performed his work well, within the limits of his powers, and nothing cap possibly be said against him personally or his fitness for the post as it was formerly conceived. Now, however, public opinion has been educated up to the need of a qualified veterinary surgeon to act as Inspector of Dairies, and in the interests of ' the district it" must be admitted that the public health requires an expert in such an important office. In the action of the Agricultural Department and of the Dairies Regulation Committee we have an earnest of the official desire to grapple with the problem of diseased meat and milk. With rigid inspection, judicious isolation, slaughtering when imperatively necessary, and the compensation of owners for the stock killed, we may hop*e to find our meat and milk innocuous, even if we cannot completely stamp out tuberculosis in all its forms.