AUTHORS’ PREFACE
Progress in the knowledge of the use of lead, the pathology of lead poisoning, and the means of preventing or mitigating the risk from it, has been rapid of late years, and has led to much legislative action in all civilized countries. The present is a fitting time, therefore, to take stock of the general position. We have both, in different ways, been occupied with the subject for several years past, the one administratively, and the other experimentally, in addition to the practical knowledge gained by examining weekly over two hundred lead-workers.
The present treatise takes account mainly of our own persona experience, and of work done in this country, especially by members of the Factory Department of the Home Office, and certifying and appointed surgeons carrying out periodical medical examinations in lead factories. The book, however, has no official sanction.
We are familiar with the immense field of Continental literature bearing on legislation against lead poisoning, but have considered any detailed reference to this outside the scope of our book, except in regard to the medical aspects of the disease.
Most of the preventive measures mentioned are enforced under regulations or special rules applying to the various industries or under powers conferred by the Factory and Workshops Act, 1901. Occasionally, however, where, in the present state of knowledge, particular processes are not amenable to the measures ordinarily applied, we have suggested other possible lines on which the dangers may be met. We have not reprinted these regulations and special rules, as anyone consulting this book is sure to have access to them in the various works published on the Factory Acts.
The practical value of the experimental inquiry described in Chapter VI., and the light it seems to throw on much that has been difficult to understand in the causation of lead poisoning, has led us to give the results in detail.
One of us (K. W. G.) is responsible for Chapters I., III., and V. to XI., and the other (T. M. L.) for Chapters II. and XII. to XVII.; but the subject-matter in all (except Chapter VI., which is the work entirely of K. W. G.) has been worked upon by both.
Our thanks are due to the Sturtevant Engineering Co., Ltd., London; Messrs. Davidson and Co., Ltd., Belfast; the Zephyr Ventilating Co., Bristol; and Messrs. Enthoven and Sons, Ltd., Limehouse, for kindly supplying us with drawings and photographs.
September, 1912.