The Dairyman's Duty

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Washington, D.C. · Mar 9, 1905

The Dairyman's Duty

Dr. Edward F. Brush, of Mount Vernon, N. Y., whose special knowledge of dairy products and practise is exceptionally thorough, read a paper on “Milk for Infant Feeding” before the American Medical Association, from which we select a few paragraphs:—

“It is easier to control cows than women. Human mothers are often emotional, excitable, indiscreet, sometimes hysterical, and not always able to control themselves. A dairyman, understanding that these conditions can affect milk, must also understand the necessity of controlling his cows. When a cow gets disturbed or hurt, the milk can be thrown away, and the excited cow can be kept from influencing the other members of the herd. From years of experience and observation I feel safe in affirming that the accountable party to the individual in the cradle is the man who is responsible for the production of the milk when the foot that rocks the cradle is not the mater who furnishes the nourishment for the baby. And, therefore, dairymen who are supplying milk for infants’ food are assuming a terrible responsibility. There are thousands of infants dying yearly from stomach and intestinal troubles who are fed on the milk sent to the cities and villages by dairymen surrounding the urban and interurban communities, and I am sure that the milkmen supplying these artificially fed infants are responsible for a large percentage of the deaths, and that these infants are killed by carelessness on the part of the dairymen supplying them with their daily food.”

“A baby is a good milk analyzer, and when there is nothing added to the milk it gets, its method of analysis is sure and simple. If the baby dies from intestinal disturbance when it has no other food than milk and sterilized water, the man furnishing the milk should be held responsible; but when physicians imagine that they can take milk fresh from the milk train, and, by some novel method of modifying, make it equal to mother’s milk, then no one can tell whether the trouble originated in the laboratory or from milk-sugar, or any of the other causes that may arise with old milk and other old things.”

“While physicians are trying to construct plans to make bad milk good, and to persuade parents that sterilizing, peptonizing, pancreatizing, modifying with cream from equally bad milk and indefinite milk-sugar, or making gruel either from barley or other cereals with the idea that this is the best that can be done, they will still have the problem unsolved of how to nourish the baby who can not get good milk from his own mother’s breast.”

“A few weeks ago a physician telephoned me that the milk I was sending to him went wrong. On inquiry I ascertained that he was adding milk-sugar and lime-water. I told him to stop the addition, and he was surprised to hear me say that milk could be fed without modifying. After three weeks his wife telephoned me, asking if she could not add sugar. She said the baby was thriving, bowels normal, but she still had the idea that something must be added. No man living to-day can prepare good food for infants from bad milk. He may modify it as he pleases, but the baby will not receive it kindly. Still, on insistence, he often takes it, and dies. I know that milk can not be improved, even by the most learned chemists that ever lived.”

“Good cow’s milk will nourish an infant without intervention of the chemist, while bad milk will kill in spite of the man who knows how to modify milk according to the most approved method.”