The other point to be noted in selecting or rejecting animals for slaughter is their general condition. This means that they should be of the proper weight,—that is, not emaciated, but with a proper amount of fat,—that the flesh should be firm and elastic and the skin supple. Nor should they be either too young or too old. A prominent example of the first error is in the sale of calves under three weeks old, known as "bob-veal," and while some sanitarians will not object to eating calves under three weeks old, the consensus of opinion is that to be fit for food a calf should be at least that age. Fortunately, it is for the interest of the butcher to hold the calf until it has arrived at a certain weight, and the stringent laws of most states prohibiting the sale of bob-veal make it dangerous and expensive for the farmer to slaughter young calves unless they are of the right age.
The most common example of the direct transmission of disease from animals to men is through the development of the parasite in a pig, known as "trichinosis." This disease is due to a minute worm scarcely visible to the naked eye which lives in the muscles of men, dogs, swine, and other animals, and also under other conditions in their intestines. Millions of the young trichinæ may live in the flesh of a pig without producing any particular difference in the appearance of the flesh. After four or five weeks, they become incased in small white spherical capsules which later, after a year or so, become entirely calcified. In this form they live for years in the flesh of the pig and do no harm in that condition. If, however, this flesh be eaten by man without being cooked so thoroughly as to destroy the little worm (about one twenty-fifth of an inch long) which has been living in these capsules, then they become distributed around the stomach of the person eating that flesh, enter the intestines, and attach themselves to the membranes there. They grow very rapidly, and broods of from 500 to 1000 young worms are produced from each one of the entering worms, and, since there may be a quarter of a million or more in an ounce of pork, it is not surprising that the total number deposited in the intestines from a single meal of raw pork is enough to produce great distress, characterized by vomiting and diarrhea. Fortunately, the disease is not necessarily serious, since after the development of the young worms (and it is at this period when the suffering of the human patient is at its height), the worms begin to form capsules again, as in the pig, and when inclosed, are again inocuous. Professor Sedgwick says that persons in robust health may be able to survive the attack of half a million or more of these flesh worms and recover, but there is a limit to human endurance, and the numbers often contained in the muscles of man from this source are almost incredible. In some severe cases, the numbers contained in human bodies have been estimated by reliable authorities to be as high as forty to sixty millions. Not long ago, the writer was impressed with the severity of this disease by having brought to his attention an epidemic in a herd of swine caused, presumably, by feeding waste which contained rinds of Western pork, infected with trichinæ and many examples may be found of regular epidemics caused by persons eating raw ham infected with this disease. Fortunately the means of prevention is very simple and implies merely the thorough cooking of the meat. If persons will avoid eating raw or underdone swine flesh in any of its varieties, no danger need be apprehended.
In general, it should be remembered that any animals dying of diseases are not fit for food, and this applies to all animals, from the largest to the smallest. Animals dying by accident, of course, are exceptions, but if diseased animals, animals dying a natural death, and animals out of condition are eliminated, the quality of food supplied from any individual farm may be approved so far as the animal itself is concerned.
The slaughter-house.
There is, however, the further question of the sanitary condition of the slaughter-house and the care of the meat after being dressed. It may be that one gets accustomed to the sight of the filthy barns or out-houses so often used for slaughtering. Places infected with flies and other insects, overrun with rats, and the effluvia of which is easily noticeable at a distance of half a mile, are not uncommon and suggest their own condemnation. While it is not possible to directly associate any particular disease with such a condition of the slaughter-house, yet such conditions must result in a rapid development of putrefactive bacteria, in the deposit by flies of different micro-organisms brought from the festering heaps of offal and manure in the vicinity, and must prevent the maintenance of the flesh in the clean and wholesome condition in which it may have been up to the time of hanging in such a place. A well-kept slaughter-house will have the ceilings, side walls, and partitions frequently painted, or else scrubbed and washed. The floor of the building, particularly, should be made water-tight, with proper drains so that the blood shall not remain on the floor to saturate the wood and develop decay. An abundance of clean water should be provided, so that the area may be thoroughly washed as often as used, with proper drains provided for carrying away the dirty water. The ventilation of the building should be complete, and provision should be made for lifting and moving carcasses without handling.
In most small slaughter-houses, the obnoxious practice prevails of maintaining a herd of swine to consume the entrails of the slaughtered animals, and a more fearsome and disgusting spectacle than a dozen lean, active hogs fighting over recently deposited entrails and wallowing up to their bellies in filth can hardly be imagined. Nor is this any fanciful picture. The writer has seen it over and over again, the income from the hogs thus fed being one of the principal assets of the establishment. Such hog meat is not fit for food. The refuse from the slaughter-house ought to be carried away and buried; its fertilizing value will not be lost if it be put in the garden, and the effect of the prompt removal of this refuse will be to improve the character of the entire slaughter-house.
FOOTNOTES:
[2] c.c. = cubic centimeter, or centister. A centimeter is about 2/5 of an inch (.3937). 1 cubic inch is about 16-1/2 c.c.