This would mean an unusual ingestion of Vitamin D by the consumer when it is considered that many pounds of bread are eaten for each pound of butter consumed. A further objection is that all consumers of the bread would take the Vitamin D which it contained whether they required it or not. The Purpose of bread is mainly to supply energy and a certain amount of protein an the quantity of bread in the diet varies in accordance with these requirements. Consequently, consumers would not only be compelled to take vitamin D, but would actually have their dose regulated not by their requirements of Vitamin D but by their energy requirements.
A person doing work might eat twice the amount of bread which a sedentary person might consume and thus get twice the dose of Vitamin D, although the vitamin requirements of both persons might be the same and considerably smaller than the amount supplied in the bread to either. Furthermore, the body requirements of Vitamin D differ according to age. The needs of an adult are less than those of a growing child, yet an adult, who probably consumes more bread than a young child, might well be getting a larger dose of the vitamin than the child, a complete reversal of what should be the case.
Another aspect of the matter is the risk of hypervitaminosis. Although, if diet is normal and contains a sufficiency of milk, the danger from hyper-vitaminosis in children would not appear to be great, there is evidence which suggests that under certain conditions (especially when the diet is lacked in milk or when the calcium intake is high and the phosphorous intake low), the risk of hyper-vitaminosis has to be seriously considered.
It is not impossible that such condition might occur in children receiving a faulty diet poor in milk and consuming appreciable quantities of bread dosed with irradiated ergosterol.
It is desirable, therefore, that the administration of Vitamin D should be capable of control and this could certainly not be ensured if Vitamin D were continually being administered in a staple daily food like bread which is eaten in varying quantities and the consumption of which is governed by needs entirely different from Vitamin D requirements. If the practice of adding irradiated ergosterol to bread became at all general, it might become impossible in some districts at any rate to obtain ordinary bread free from this substance.
A further outbreak of lead poisoning from the drinking of cider was reported in September from Devonshire and clinical notes on ten or twelve cases have been published. The outbreak was, as in former cases, traced to the use of lead pipes for conveying cider from barrels to the engine at the public house bar.
Cider that had remained all night in the pipes was found to contain appreciable amounts of lead. It was stated that the pipes were tin-lined and that the publicans had been assured by the makers that such pipes could not possibly lead to contamination of cider.
In any case the practice of allowing cider and beer to come into contact with lead is reprehensible. Unavoidable sources of lead in foods and drinks are sufficiently numerous without being multiplied unnecessarily. Injury to health from traces of lead dose not necessarily begin only with obvious symptoms of lead colic. there may be, and probably are, lesser degrees of lead poisoning, manifested only in generally impaired health and vitality, and not obviously attributable to any definite cause. Pipes properly lined with a thick coating of are available.
Another case has occurred of antimony poisoning from the use of enameled vessels. At a Christmas dinner to the staff of a well known London hospital, lemonade was served which had been prepared in new enamelled iron jugs. During the progress of the dinner, and subsequently one after another of the hospital staff was seized with violent sickness, until eventually sixty-five out of seventy were more or less seriously affected.
It was found that acid lemonade had attacked the enamel of the jugs and had become highly charged with soluble compounds of antimony. Fortunately there were no deaths.
