NOTES AND COMMENTS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LV, Issue 16895, 6 July 1918, Page 6

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

■«■ j A PEACE WITHOUT PLENTY. ! ■ The liaison officer of the Ministry of i Food with the United States Food Admin-1 ! istvation, Sir William Goodc, uttered n ■ ; warning recently against an inconclusive ! peace, which, he declared, would mean ' ! peace without p'enty, and increased prij vat : in tin British Isles. I.eavin:. j Rilfsia out of the question, then- were ' 200.000.000 people in Europe, most of ' whom were petting far less food a day than , people in England got under Compulsory ' rations. In response to the imperious de- ' ■ maud ol thtir underfed populations, the ; i Governments of the enemy countries, tho ' moment peine was declared, would rush to buy food wherever they could get it. What effort this inevitable impulse on the . put of the hungry hordes of the Central i Empires would have up n the people in England entirely depended upon the char- ' actor of the peace terms. "The figures J which 1 have had before me," added Sir j WiJl'am. " prove that even if shipping I were immediately available on the dcclarai 'ion of pence to lift all the world's export--1 able surplus of foodstuffs, it would still be ! impossible to raise the daily ration of the : 200,000,000 people of the Continent of i Europe U. anything like its normal level I further redwing the now restricted i food supplies of the United Kingdom. It; I may be said that this presents a hopeless I picture, and that tho situation is like to I ijet worse the longer peace of any kind j is delayed. Not at nil. The United Kingdom is the only European belligerent country when, the stock of cattle has not been seriously diminished, and where the pro- | duction of iood has actually been increased 1 since the declaration of war. I think it' ! is now safe to say that at the end of this i year we shall be well on our way to ' recover our position of the seventies; in j other words, to he on the high road to i independence of imported bread supp'ies. At any rate, there is excellent indication that every month we hold out : we become more and more able to meet j the problems that must arise when peace is considered and declared, and that next | year we shall be infinitely better prepared to weather a food storm than we are I now." i i GERMAN WAR CREDIT. The l.ici man Secretary for Finance, Count Koedern, moved in the Reichstag . in April the first reading of the Bill pro- > , viding for a credit of £750 000.000. tier many* monthly war expenditure, he said, . had increased from £100.000.000 during the winter of 1915-16 to £187,500000 during the last five months. "(If the total , ; war costs of £27,500.000.000." the Minis- , ! tor continued, " the Entente has hitherto I expended £1'.500.000,000 and the Con- , Ural Powers only £9,000.000 000. Our ! military successes have silenced the guns I in the East, and our full strength is now , I being directed against the West. Here I our enemies did not desire to hear any- | thing about peace. M. Clemenceau and | Mr. Bnnar Law have once again preached ; the destruction of Prussian militarism With sueh catchwords, however. Ger- , I many cannot he beaten and vanquished." Heir 1-Jaase, leader of the Minority I Socialist Party, then made the following 1 declaration "We shall move the re- ' i jection of the vote of credit at the third ! reading." The first and second readings ■ were then passed without debate. CAUSES OF BOTULISM. Botulism, which has bam brought prominently before the public of Bri- " tain during the past few weeks, is not a new dieease, for as far back ' as 1395 von Krmengen isolated the • causative perms from a ham which was ' answerable for the death of three people - who had eaten of it. The organism appears ito be saprophytic—that is, it lives on dead lor decaying organic matter— it is anae- ) robic. which means that it will grow only ' in the absence of free oxygen. In this t latter characteristic it resembles the bacil- [ lus of tetanus, popularly called lockjaw, . and it has the further important point in 3 common with the latter that it produces t [ spores or seeds. Spores are notoriously

l ; fticult to kill, and may remain active I or 12 months. Botulism is now regarded : is a toxiemia—a poisoned state of the i jjood— to the consumption of meat ; ■vhich has been contaminated with the' bacillus botulinus, and in which the toxin ! or poison is present at the time it is eaten. As in the case of tetanus and diphtheria, ; the toxin is extremely poisonous, the fatal ' dose for a man being as little as 0.035 of a milligramme. Fortunately it is quite; easily destroyed by boiling and by other ; methods of cooking, so that the danger of the disease is limited to the consumption j of uncooked or very insufficiently cooked 1

food. Sacquepes has pointed out that the symptoms of botulism only follow the consumption of " preserved" foods, and this, of course, includes such articles as sausages, which are sometimes made some months before they are eaten, ham, meats preserved in tins and bottles, game pies, and similar things. Unfortunately there is often no peculiarity I in tho odour or taste of the meat to indij cate that it is dangerous. The animal from which the flesh was obtained may j have been quite healthy, and the bacillus J have gained access to the flesh after slaughtering. The symptoms of poisoning ; ) often begin to snow themselves almost i immediately after , the meat is eaten, ; though they may not occur lor % hours 'or more. Usually they take the form of \ nausea, vomVung, iMravmaX $»m ( and 'constipation. The patient may complain \ oi double vision, the eyeYi&s may fowp,\ I sometimes there is difficulty in girflJJoii'-' ing, and there is almost always petit' ) weakness. The mortality rate is high, and 1 those who survive recover very slowly.: ! The poison produced by the bacillus works 1 specifically on the nervous system, ai.'l i i also on the heart.