Concerning Anti-Streptococcic Serum and Its Use in Malignant Endocarditis.

Abstract

720large amount of antiseptic-namely, alcohol-which they contain, and the need for antiseptics, such as salicylic acid, is largely due to a commendable desire on the part of a large proportion of the public to have wholesome and agreeable beverages free from the risk of the moral and physical evils which too often attend the use of alcoholic drinks. °We desire to make it clear that we are not now discussing the recommendation of the Commission that the law should be altered so as to require manufacturers to state the nature and amount of the preservative, whatever it may be, which is present in certain articles sold. The practical point at issue between us and the Commission is that the latter, though allowing the use of salicylic acid, would limit it to one grain per pint, while we maintain that if a larger proportion is necessary for the manufacture and preservation of the article there is no valid reason why it should not be employed. It is scarcely necessary to insist on the fact that if a preservative is to be used some articles will require more of it than others and it by no means follows that the article most difficult to preserve is the least valuable and nutritious. Thus, to take an extreme case, let us suppose that there is a demand for a temperance beverage with a flavour of raspberries. Such a beverage can be produced in a variety of ways. It may be prepared by pressing out the juice of raspberries with such additions as are necessary to render it sufficiently fluid and agreeable to the taste, or it may be prepared without the help of any fresh fruit at all, using a chemical body, the so-called essence, to give the distinctive flavour. It is clear that the latter being free from nitrogenous matters will be much more easily preserved than the former, though the former would certainly be the more agreeable beverage and would approach much more nearly to the characters of natural fruit. We are convinced that one effect of the arbitrary limitation of the amount of preservative allowed will be to force manufacturers of the so-called non-alcoholic fruit wines and other temperance beverages to employ artificial flavouring bodies prepared in the laboratory instead of the natural juice of the fruit. One noted firm, harassed by successive prosecutions.has written to us as follows : I-We are now in the strange predicament of being compelled to discontinue the use of the nutrient article and use a substitute rather than that an antiseptic be used. But the game of fighting when, win or lose, one cannot recover expenses, is too one-sided to be interesting, especially as the other will pay us at least quite as well." We have also good authority for alleging that another result of these prosecutions is to set manufacturers to work to discover antiseptics which cannot be recognised by the analytical chemist and we are informed that such an antiseptic is already employed by one firm. It is surely in the interests of the public that an antiseptic should be employed the presence and amount of which can be determined...