OUR BABIES

Taranaki Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 146000, 5 December 1917, Page 5

OUR BABIES

fit HYGEIA. Published under the auspices of the Royal New Zealand Society for the Health of Women and Children. “It is wiser to put up a fence at the top of a precipice than to maintain an ambulance at the bottom."’ RELATIVE FOOD VALUES. The following summary of a lecture delivered by Dr. Truby King during Dominion Baby Week at the Burns Hall, Dunedin, is adapted from one of the newspaper reports: — With “Relative Food Values” for his subject, Dr. Truby King delivered last evening a most arresting address, lighting up his facts with such humour and mziking points so racily that the very large audience assembled in Bums Hall had almost as much entertainment as instruction ; and every minute of the lecturer’s 90 minutes’ demonstration was worth attention. The staging behind Dr. King was a composite assemblage of the stock-in-trade of the grocer and the butcher; and the first thought of every person must have been that the stock was displayed in a very lop-sided way. On the left sacks of wheat, barley, oatmeal, flour, tins of biscuits, cakes, jars of bovnl, etc., etc., rose tier on tier; on his other side were merely the carcases of a pig, an ox, a sheep, a few strings, of sausages, a fish, a chicken, a few samples of tinned meats, cans of milk, £kim-milk, whey, cream and cheese. The unequal balance was purposeful, or rather the balance was economically and not artistically adjusted. lor presently Dr. King was telling his audience

That the huge quantity of vegetable matter op the left was the quantity absorbed by the animals to produce the flesh exhibit on the right; and that, while the vegetable matter on exhibit would keep a man, his wife, and four children for 12 months, the flesh exhibit would keep only one of them for six months.The words are not Dr. King’s, hut the sentence summarises his exposition and gives some idea of his trend; and a very interesting aspect of the food question it exposes—in view of existing prices. Without further anticipation of his argument, let us follow him-from the beginning.

Comparative Food Values and Cost ot Animal v. .Vegetable Materials.

The lecturer asked What was the weight of grain needed to make a, pound of pork? and answered that it took 51b. of barley to mane lib. of pork. It was universally true that animals could return in tho form of meat, milk, or eggs only a small fraction of the nutrient value of what they consumed. They gave back from 5 per cent, to 10 ner cent.-of what was fed to them. What was the economic significance? In the East were found nations living almost entirely on vegetable matter, whoso rate of - wages was from k to 2s, against from 10s to 15s here. . It meant, in-fact, that if people lived entirely on animal matter it would take over ten times as much money to provide them with food as if they lived solely, on vegetable matter. Therefore the whole problem of domestic economics', and especially war-time economics,, was summed up in one question on the housewife’s part; How far can I, without harming the family, and indeed with actual benefit to them, use in the daily meals a. smaller proportion of animal and a larger proportion of vegetable material?

The Importance of Adhering to Nature’s Standards.

I>r. King indicated the three essential nutrient materials in all Toods—sugars and starches, fat of oils, and proteid. or flesh-forming material. Incidentally he mentioned the fact that in the milk for tb« hirm-'n homr, proportion of proteid was IJoz. per 100, while for the call it was' s~oz. per iuj —a fact which showed how absurd it was to think that the milk of one being could be transferred to the use of another being without modification. Some mothers had the fallacious belief that cow’s milk, having nearly three times as much proteid as human milk, its use would be merely am error on the right side. But Nature’s proportions were infallible. The whole human body was a huge poison factory, which only the circulation of the blood and the healthy action of the kidneys and other organs swept free from the poisons; and of all these poisonous substances nothing compared with the waste products of proteid. In placing upon a child’s kidneys (which were in process of growth and highly vulnerable) two or three times the work for, which the Creator designed them, wo were exposing tho children to overstrain, debility, and even death ;and even if they survived, tho health of children whoso organs were thus overtaxed in infancy tended to break down in middle life through the failure of the kidneys and other damaged structures —Bright s Disease being a typical example.

Components and Nutrient Values ot Different Food Materials.

Returning to his main subject, Dr. King particularised the components and nutrient values of different food materials. Milk, he said, contained 12J per cent, of solids, steak .25 per cent, (proteids and fat). The following direct statements gave definite information to the uninitiated ; One half-pint of milk is equivalent to about quarter of a pound of beefsteak.

A pint of milk is equal in nutrient material to five eggs; a quarter-pint of milk has more feeding value than one egg. Cheese is 60 per cent, solid. When you work it out you will find that a pound of cheese has a feeding value equivalent to a bout three pounds of meat, allowing for a little bone waste. The present price of meat is about the same as that of cheese; therefore Is spent on cheese will buy nearly three times as much food material as it would if spent on buying tho best

joint of meat. “You say, 'We will do away with flesh foods, then,’ ” said Dr. King. “You are not to do that. ' It would not he good for vou. We have got used to tho ‘bad habit’ of living on our humbler follow-beings. But if one decided to Hvo upon the vegetable world, what would be the cheapest way of living? The cheapest thing to live on is wheat, which contains all the elements of food in fair proportion, except fat. Even common painter’s linseed oil would supply that element, and the shortage of "-viteid could beJ made up by peas or

This statement provoked laughter, and “You smile,” said the doctor, “but linseed oil sometimes agrees with babies better than the fat of cow’s milk.” Boiled wheat, he added, was rather like young Indian Corn, and, it put to it, people could live on wheat as a large proportion of their diet. Supposing they did, it would take about lilb. a day to keep a man, which at the present high price would involve an expense of 2d a day. The proportionate amount (in nutrient quality) of potatoes would cost !id a day, or meat 4s a day, of bread, say, Cd.

The cheapest properly-balanced vegetable ration for a- man would be lilb. of wheat, an ounce or two of split peas, and an ounce of oil or fat.,.. Such a diet would cost under 3d. a day.

Memo, by “Hygeia.”—No, one would suggest living from choice on such a monotonous and unappetising diet; hut the information is invaluable as showing the fundamental . requirements. Further, it is specially interesting at the present time to picture what it would bo best for us to procure if forced, owing to the war, to live on restricted rations and keep the family in good health at a minimum of cost.

How very little we should really need in the way of such luxuries as moat, milk, and eggs on the one hand, or on the other hand such cottage garden products as potatoes, cabbages, or lettuce as substitutes for part of tho .above to keep the family in the very pink of condition. There is nothing like war and privation to brace us all up to some appreciation of tho, exacting, wasteful, pampered, overfed lives we lead.

ELABORATED GRAINS. And now tho lecturer proceeded to deal with the products milled and prepared by man from'the simple wheat, barley, etc. Ho pointed out that the more man ground, sifted, and elaborated the original grain the dearer the products became and the less healthful, generally speaking, for . a national diet. Dealing with one highly-va-unted food, he said that the staple material from which it was worked up was exported and sold (its main use being for painting houses! at 4d. a. pound. In the food form in which it was sold in Now Zealand it cost £1 a pound, and yet- in derivation, composition, and nutritive value it -had been proved to be almost identical with cottage cheese—£l„ a pound for cottage (or skim-milk) cheese ! Another high-priced article of food he described as not evon_ possessing tho saving quality of being worth 4d a pound, since it contained no nutriment at all.