As nearly as could be ascertained during the season lasting from September 1st to April 30th about 200 barrels of shell oysters and about 10 to 11 thousand gallons of bulk or shucked oysters are sold in the city of Erie. All of the shell oysters are sold at the Shaaf and Fulton Market Stores and about 5,000 gallons, or about 50 per cent. of the shucked oysters are sold at these stores. The remaining quantity is sold at 73 stores in various parts of the city.

The preponderance of oysters used in Erie came from waters regularly tested at the Lederle Laboratories of New York City and the oysters were examined by the same experts and certified as to purity. Furthermore, the distribution of typhoid cases and the run of the epidemic, and the manner in which the oysters were handled and the freedom from sickness of all persons engaged in the wholesale or retail handling of oysters relieved this food product from suspicion or having been a contributory cause of the onset or spread of the epidemic.

14. Fruit and Vegetables.

Charles Palmisano, 1724 Peach St., Louis Phillip, 451 W. 16th St., and the Rossi Fruit Co., 1614 Peach St., control the banana trade and the greater part of the trade in fruits not grown in the immediate vicinity of the city of Erie. Most of the small dealers purchase their supplies from the above wholesalers.

The principal fact elicited upon investigation was that no green bananas are taken away from the premises of these three dealers by street venders to ripen at the venders' homes. The green bananas are kept on the wholesalers' premises and if purchased before ripened are tagged and taken away as they ripen.

The manner in which vegetables are grown and placed upon the market in the city was investigated. Ten of the largest truck farmers' estates were examined. Nearly all of the celery used in Erie after December is shipped in from a long distance.

A number of farmers conduct small truck patches just outside the city and market the product during the summer months only. Most of the farmers having small milk routes are growers of some green vegetables which they sell during the season. No night soil is used as fertilizer by these farmers. The Department found no cause for suspecting any food stuffs in connection with the transmission of typhoid fever for the period investigated.

15. THE MILK SUPPLY.

a-Typhoid Among Patrons of City Milk Dealers.

The typhoid epidemic was not of milk borne origin.

Milk venders might have spread the disease after it got widely seated in the city; but there is absence of evidence that the disease was disseminated in this way to any extent.

The proof of these assertions follows.

Briefly, no person is permitted to deal in milk or cream in Erie without first having obtained a license. The licensed dealer or vender must keep the city Board of Health informed of whom he obtains his supply, and he shall not distribute milk or cream from any other than a healthy animal so certified by a veterinarian to the satisfaction of the health authorities.

There were in Erie during the epidemic, three citizens who owned a cow each and produced milk on the premises supplying a few quarts daily to neighbors; one vender who peddles milk along a route carrying the product in a basket, the supply being purchased from a dairyman; 92 milk routes operated daily by 60 dealers and 107 stores and 11 ice-cream manufacturers engaged in business under the said license system. All of the milk and cream was handled through these channels with one or two immaterial exceptions.

There was a total of 487 dairies supplying milk and cream to the city of Erie. One hundred and eighty of them were in Crawford County and the balance in Erie County. Not a case of typhoid fever occurred at one of these places of production or among those handling the milk. The county medical inspector for these counties personally visited every typhoid patient in his district. The city milk inspector made a special sanitary investigation of every one of the dairies during the epidemic. The inspections by the State Department officers of the Engineering Division were made at the creameries and principal points of shipment, particularly with respect to the methods of handling the milk and keeping it clean.

The Erie County Milk Association is the greatest dealer. It not only collects and brings the milk to the city but distributes it.

Of 981 cases of typhoid fever canvassed in the city, 17 were reported as receiving no milk whatsoever and 22 as using condensed milk only, making 39 who did not use natural milk or cream, leaving 942 who were supplied with milk. Of this number 7 were supplied from their own or neighbors cows, 10 from unknown sources, 17 from stores supplied from doubtful sources not charged to dealers and 908 cases occurred among the patrons of 57 dealers conducting milk routes. But among these dealers there were 941 cases which gives 33 typhoid victims receiving milk from more than one of the dealers. In table XXX the 941 cases occurring among the patrons of the dealers conducting milk routes are given with other data:

TABLE XXX.

TYPHOID CASES AMONG THE PATRONS OF EACH DEALER ALONG HIS MILK ROUTE.

Analyzing the cases on the routes of Helman, Haynes, and Rinderlee, those dealers having the highest percentage of typhoid fever among their customers, it appears that along the Helman route in one family three cases occurred and in two other families 2 cases each occurred. On Hazle Street in one block 7 cases occurred between January 18th and February 19th. There was visiting back and forth. In 4 instances only did the families receive filk in bottles all the other

each

customers were supplied from milk in bulk kept in cans. Out of 180 quarts sold daily, 15 only were delivered in bottles. If the bulk milk were infected on any single day, naturally a number of onsets would have followed about the same time. The fact is that the cases were distributed among his customers from December 26th, to March 17th, one being in December, 13 in January, 12 in February and 7 in March. Furthermore, along parts of his route where there were a considerable number of typhoid fever cases none of them happened among his customers. supplied a district adjacent to the reservoir.

c-Haynes' Milk Route.

He

Haynes drove two routes as is shown in Chart No. 4. He started in the city at 21st street and passed northerly and easterly by a circuitous route to the square. This being denoted Route No. 1. He then took on more milk at the Square trolley station and drove out along west Third and Second streets, denoted Route No. 2. By reference to the chart it will be noted that the second route passed through a district dotted with typhoid cases of which eight only were supplied with milk by Hayne. No two cases occurred in the same household among his patrons. The order successively in which he delivered milk along the route to the customers where the disease occurred and the onset for route No. 2 was as follows:

The February 4th onset might have been primary to the February 9th and 25th onsets. The January 25th case might have been primary to those of February 1st, 6th and 19th, respectively. There is no proof of this. Haynes supplied all his milk in bottles. He might have interchanged. There would be more reason to suspect this agency if West Third Street were not at the time the most densely infected district of the city.

Data relative to Route No. 1 onsets are as follows:

At a glance the only case along Route No. 1 that could possibly have been secondary through Haynes agency was that of February 22nd. As the chart shows, no cases occurred among the patrons of Haynes for a mile or more along the route until he came into the thickly infected district.