User:Ineuw/Interesting/NY Times 1877 article on nutrition

Published: New York Times February 12, 1877

 

POISONED TABLE FOOD.

THE INJURIOUS EFFECTS OF PRESERVED VEGETABLES—COPPERED PEAS AND GREEN PICKLES.

 

Mr Bernard Dyer F.C.S., member of the Society of Public Analysts, writes to a London newspaper: "The question raised on Monday in the Marlborough Street Police Court as to the injurious effects of preserved vegetables contaminated with copper salts is, as Mr Knox remarked, one of much public interest. The consumption of tinned vegetables and preserved fruits, particularly during the Winter months, is sufficiently large to give rise to a considerable trade in these and similar articles and it seems to me that every precaution ought to be taken to insure their supply in a condition free from a clearly unnecessary admixture with a substance the poisonous nature of which is even open to question. Every respect must of course, be paid to the evidence of Dr. Pavy, who is reported to have asserted that the daily consumption of.31 grain of copper (equivalent to 1.22 grain of blue vitriol) might be unattended with injury, and it is also true that the British Pharmacopœia prescribes a dose of.25 of a grain to two grains of this salt as an astringent medicine. On these grounds, presumably, Mr. Lewis raised for the defense the objection that copper, so far from being injurious, is actually beneficial to health—a statement which requires but slight extension to imply that persons careful of their well-being ought, by preference to dine on preserved peas containing one grain or more portion of sulphate of copper or its equivalent. Dr. Taylor distinctly refers to the coloration of fruits, vegetables, &c. with copper salts as a noxious practice, and one which may be fraught with injurious results to the consumer. There is no doubt copper frequently owes its presence in articles of food to the use of copper vessels in the process of preparation, without any necessarily fraudulent intention on the part of the manufacturer; but if this loop-hole for escape be left open, it will be practically impossible to obtain any conviction in the case of more serious offenders, unless the proportion of copper found should happen to be excessively large. If moreover, the copper vessels be properly tinned, no material contamination need result from their use. The sale of pickles colored by means of copper-salts may certainly henceforth be carried on with impunity if the plea set up by Mr. Lewis is to hold good, for the quantity of pickles likely to be consumed in a single meal by any one person would naturally be less than in the case of preserved vegetables or fruits, and the actual weight of copper contained in one dose—copper being, moreover assumed to be 'actually beneficial to health'—must of course, be deemed trivial and beneath the consideration of the law. Now, this is a state of things which, I submit should be guarded against, particularly since it is well known that a considerable proportion of the brilliant green pickles and bottled fruits offered for sale, both abroad and in this country, are colored—whether intentionally or carelessly but matters but little—with that I still venture to consider as an acrid metallic poison. Not very long since I was led to test some bright green pickles, the nauseous, biting taste of which raised in my mind a suspicion as to their purity. accordingly, after dinner I took the bottle into my laboratory, and soon convinced myself of the presence of copper—in this instance, be it noticed, in sufficient large quantity to render the pickles quite unpalatable. The bottle, I may add, bore the capsule as well as the label of a well-known English firm, the genuineness of whose goods ought certainly to have been above suspicion. By decisive action we have fairly stamped out the greater evil of lead contamination in lemonade and other aerated waters. Would it not also be desirable to get rid of copper contamination in pickles, fruits, and vegetables?"

The London Lancet says: "It is just now, curiously enough, a vexed question how much copper—a foreign and, under certain conditions, poisonous substance, with which preserved peas are adulterated to impart a fine green color to the article—may be taken by the consumer without actual injury. This is a novel mode of looking at the subject. How much lead can be introduced into hair-dyes without afflicting those who use them with lead-colic or lead-palsy?" How much arsenic may be spread over wall-paper without seriously affecting those who inhabit apartments in which such deleterious decorations are employed? How long may a man go on eating dishes poisoned with minute doses of antimony before he succumbs? Common sense suggests that it would be wise too eliminate poisons such as lead, arsenic, antimony, and copper from our food, especially when they are only required for coloring purposes. We think it would be well if the law simply registered and applied the dictates of common sense.