You will observe that the Tilsit cases are referred to in this article to
strengthen the argument, although, as it must be * * * known that I had
investigated that matter, and knew that .the amount of disease was greatly
exaggerated, and that the pork used was undoubtedly the domestic article,
this case is passed lightly over as a newspaper statement. * * * The great
fact remains that the bills of health show no particular inconvenience from
the consumption of this article of food in Germany or elsewhere. The article
admits that such inconvenience does not arise elsewhere, and would not exist
in Germany did not the consumers here like the flavor of raw pork. There may
be something in the argument that the customs of a country should be
considered by its rulers, and if the people here will eat raw pork and so
get disease, diseased pork that would be made sound by cooking must be kept
out of the country.
The falling off of importations of American pork being so great as
represented, it is claimed that the alleged evil should soon cure itself,
and it is not worth while to disturb the tranquillity of two continents by
prohibiting an importation that has decreased by eight-ninths in a single
year. The argument is not ingenuous. A partial prohibition, covering all our
chopped meats and sausages, was in operation in 1882, and the threatened
prohibition of all pork products, which has been since pending, contributed,
with less production in the United States, to decrease the amount sent
here.
[Inclosure in No. 155.—Extract from the
Norddeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, May 16,
1883.—Translation.]
In view of the lively discussion caused by the publication of the report
of the American minister at Berlin, concerning the prohibition of the
importation of American pork, it seems appropriate to call attention to
the sanitary grounds upon which alone the issue of that prohibition was
based.
On the American side it is asserted with emphasis that the frequent
occurrence of trichinӕ in American pork is a fable, such pork being
really much more healthy than the German. This assertion is entirely
unfounded. Apart from the circumstance that uniform measures for the
suppression of contagious diseases of animals are utterly wanting in the
United States, the official investigations, even as to the extent of the
danger, and especially as to the occurrence of trichinӕ, are not
commensurate with the requirements that must, in the interest of
thoroughness, be insisted on in compiling-statistics. The pamphlet of
Mr. Scanlan, “American Pork,” often cited by the opponents of
prohibition, touches trichinosis quite superficially only, confining
itself essentially to general unauthenticated statements of individual
pork-packers and by hog-raisers, that is to say, of persons interested
in an unobstructed sale.
Under these circumstances we must consult supplementary investigations in
Germany and other countries of Europe, and the statements of American
experts (veterinary and medical persons).
Let it be remarked in advance that the microscopic examination of hogs
raised in Germany has yielded the following results: Of 12,816,931 hogs
examined in Prussia during the period from 1876 to 1880, 6,945, or 0.054
per cent., contained trichinӕ; of 29,832 examined at Dresden, in 1878,
and of 41,500 examined at the same place, in 1881, 11 and 7, or 0.036
and 0.017 per cent., respectively, were thus affected; and of 444,832
hogs examined in the duchy of Brunswick during an extended period, 74,
or 0.017 per cent., contained trichinӕ.
How, on the other hand, does American pork stand in this respect? The
health commissioner of the city of Chicago, Dr. Dewolff, found that from
3 to 5 per cent. of the hogs examined by him contained trichinӕ. The
health officer of Erie, Pa., Germer, places on the bases of an
experience of long years the percentage of hogs containing trichinӕ at
something less than eight in a hundred. Billings, of Boston, a
veterinary surgeon, educated in Germany, has particularly occupied
himself closely with the subject, and, pursuant to his latest
communications in No. 222 and in later numbers of the New York Medical
Journal, of March last, there were in 1879, among 2,701 hogs, 154, or
5.7 per cent., and in the years 1879, 1880, and 1881, among 8,774 hogs,
345, or about 4 per cent., which were found to contain trichinӕ. The
results of investigations in Europe are entirely in accord herewith; at
Turin, Volanti found 4 per cent.; French experts found 3 per cent. to
contain trichinӕ. In Germany the average of imported American pork is 4
per cent.; a lot of living hogs imported thence into Germany, in 1880,
yielded even 15.9 (in Dresden) and 23.3 per cent. (in Madgeburg)
containing trichinӕ. It is therefore evident that the danger of
trichinosis from indulgence in American pork, including the sides of
fat, which always contain layers of meat, is absolutely, as well as in
comparison with our German product, extremely great; it is more than
sixty times as great as in the case of German pork.
Examinations at the places of importation have not proven to be an
efficacious means of control, the microscopic examination being less
reliably performed at those places in consequence of the great
quantities to be inspected in a short time. It thus repeatedly occurred
that meat certified to at a port of entry as being free from trichinӕ
was, upon a subsequent examination in the interior, found to contain
trichinӕ.
The objection has been raised that the number of cases of disease
actually arising from indulgence in American pork is not in harmony with
the above. To meet this objection it must be stated that in ports of
entry epidemic trichinosis has repeatedly been proven to have been
caused by indulgence in such meat (as, for instance, in Bremen, Rostock,
Dusseldorf, and, according to recent newspaper notices, at Tilsit), but
that apart from these instances, it has, in many cases, been found quite
impossible to ascertain the source of meat that had occasioned disease,
the fact having been established that a very
considerable part of the pork from America is sent to Germany but
slightly cured (brined), and is then worked up here and adapted to German
taste, and finally put on the market as Westphalian hams, Gotha or
Brunswick cervelat, sausages, &c. The American method of
preparation does not suit German taste. Diseases arising from trichina
wares thus imported, or naturalized in Germany, are, as a matter of
course, charged to the account of our domestic hogs.
It is also an entirely unfounded assertion, in conflict with the results
of close scientific examination, that trichinӕ are destroyed by the
customary salting and smoking of pork. There is but one reliable way of
attaining this end—to cook the meat thoroughly, trichinӕ not being able
to withstand boiling heat. In point of fact, in most of the other states
of Europe pork is eaten only when thus cooked, and that is why there is
much less complaint about trichinӕ elsewhere than with us; for the
German consumer prefers a product the natural good flavor of which is
not impaired by high
[Page 385]
seasoning. But as our Government must, in the measures it takes, reckon
with the habits of our people, it was a simple duty, on its part, to
ward off, by a decree of prohibition, so serious a danger, and one
against which the poorer portion of the consuming public, in particular,
could not in the least protect itself.
In conclusion, a word about the economic importance of the importation.
The amount of meat (fresh and prepared, article 25, g. 1 of the tariff),
imported into Germany in 1881 was 190,090 double cwt.; deducting the
amount of the export, 56,283 double cwt., there remains 133,807 double
cwt. meat (game, beef, veal, pork, sides, &c.); of this about
three-quarters, or 100,355 double cwt., consist of pork and sides. The
entire consumption of pork, including sides from domestic hogs and from
importations (in particular from Russia and Austria-Hungary), of pork
and living hogs amounted, on the other hand, in 1881, according to the
most exact calculation possible, to 4,106,483 double cwt.; hence the
importation from abroad of pork covers only 22/5 per cent. of the entire
amount consumed. But even this comparatively small amount of 100,355
double cwt., decreased, in the year 1882, to the ninth part; that is to
say, to 11,444 double cwt., although no decree of prohibition had as yet
been issued, and the apprehension of such decree should rather have
stimulated importation. Thus the best testimony is afforded of the
slight importance of the matter from am economic standpoint.
