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Lead is a well-established environmental contaminant that over the last 50 years has become recognized as a neurotoxin with its greatest concern for the developing child (i.e. both in-utero and postnatally). What is problematic is that children exposed to lead often come from lower socioeconomic status (SES), are largely Black communities and are further at increased risk for developing adverse childhood experiences (ACEs). The literature on ACEs had focused much on trauma, single parenting, child abuse, lack of finances and stress, etc., but has not considered the intersectionality of these ACEs as risk factors within environmental neurotoxic exposures such as lead poisoning. This is important as most low SES communities are Black. In particular, within the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA), Black families have been neglected of proper lead-abatement to their apartments for nearly 70 years.

This is a viewpoint/perspective paper that examines the lived experiences of Black folxs in NYCHA through a Black critical theory (BlackCrit) and antiblackness framework pertaining to ACEs, and lead poisoning within the NYCHA system of New York City. This perspective paper draws upon the last three years of news reports, five decades of publicly available data sets from NYCHA and the comptroller to raise an awareness of how Black children are treated by NYCHA generation after generation which can be argued as a mass atrocity against NYCHA residents. Furthermore, the systematic and institutionalized racism and environmental injustices by NYCHA and the state can also be considered as a crime against humanity. As such, BlackCrit could help to position awareness, advocacy and knowledge about Black folxs residing in NYCHA to achieve fair, safe and affordable public housing to experience Black joy across future generations.

Thus, rather than civic and state government response efforts focusing their full attention and resources to serving and supporting individuals affected by ACEs they should equally consider the environments in which Black people live and also allocate funds proportionally to address these areas often overlooked. Moreover, proportions of these funds should be redirected especially to lead-abatement and removal of known sources of lead exposures, evaluation of suspected sources of lead exposures (i.e. drinking water, baby food and formula, children’s juice and cereal products, superfund and other waste sites, electronic recycling plants, etc.) and accompanied by all affected children undergoing full and comprehensive neuropsychological testing and follow up studies paid for by the state. The goal should have two fundamental objectives: (1) accepting accountability for failing to address these preventable neuropsychological issues directly affecting Black children generation after generation and (2) offering the proper waived or reimbursable supports and resources to help Black children sustain the best quality of life (QOL) trajectory possible when diagnosed with lead poisoning.

The manuscript is a viewpoint/perspective paper grounded in BlackCrit and an antiblackness framework. There are ample public news reports and public data available from NYCHA on these matters over the last three years. However, the scope of this paper was not to delve too deep into these numbers per se, but rather to address the concerns leading up to and arguably contributing to, at least in part, to these numbers of lead-exposed Black children in NYCHA. Lead poisoning has never been considered as an ACE and its relationship to mass atrocity research is novel which may pave a new avenue for research of this kind through the utility of BlackCrit and antiblackness framework to support and advocate for change so that Black children can be provided with a basic human right of safe housing and experience Black joy.

BlackCrit has not been used in the context of lead poisoning research. Mostly individuals and families of middle- and low-income have been studied in the context of poverty and lead poisoning. However, many people who live in poverty, in public housing, within New York are Black. Thus, Black children are generation after generation exposed to unaddressed lead-abatement and it appears that now more than ever BlackCrit should become the framework for how this work should be discussed in the literature to raise awareness to state governments regarding Black folx's persistent lead poisoning, NYCHA's neglect and mass atrocity research as a long overdue advocacy effort to bring the necessary voice, authentic narrative, and actual knowledge of the lived experiences of Black families in NYCHA with lead poisoning.

The goal of this viewpoint/perspective paper should have two fundamental objectives (1) NYCHA and New York State accepting accountability for failing to address these preventable lead poisoning issues directly affecting Black children; and (2) offering the proper support and resources to help Black children sustain the best QOL trajectory possible when diagnosed with lead poisoning.

Lead poisoning research has never been approached through a mass atrocity and BlackCrit framework and perspective. This is the first report on bridging these fields within the context of NYCHA public housing neglect of lead-abatement and continued poisoning of current and future generations of Black children. This failure of NYCHA lead-abatement contributes annually to economic loss in New York State for many years to come which could be entirely avoided.

A marked increase in the incidence of microbial food poisoning parallels increasing scientific and public concern about microbiological hazards. This literature review highlights the important pathogens involved in the increase and issues salient to developing effective risk‐benefit communication with the public about microbial food poisoning. Research into public perceptions of microbiological food hazards is reviewed, together with public attitudes towards one of the technologies that could combat food poisoning: food irradiation. Suggestions for reducing the incidence of microbial food poisoning through effective communication strategies are provided.

Describes a study to measure the quality of service provided by food‐poisoning surveillance agencies in England and Wales in terms of the requirements of a representative consumer ‐ the egg producing industry ‐ adopting “egg associated” outbreak investigation reports as the reference output. Defines and makes use of four primary performance indicators: accessibility of information; completeness of evidence supplied in food‐poisoning outbreak investigation reports as to the sources of infection in “egg‐associated” outbreaks; timeliness of information published; and utility of information and advice aimed at preventing or controlling food poisoning. Finds that quality expectations in each parameter measured are not met. Examines reasons why surveillance agencies have not delivered the quality demanded. Makes use of detailed case studies to illustrate inadequacies of current practice. Attributes failure to deliver “accessibility” to a lack of recognition on the status or nature of “consumers”, combined with a self‐maintenance motivation of the part of the surveillance agencies. Finds that failures to deliver “completeness” and “utility” may result from the same defects which give rise to the lack of “accessibility” in that, failing to recognize the consumers of a public service for what they are, the agencies feel no need to provide them with the data they require. The research indicates that self‐maintenance by scientific epidemiologists may introduce biases which when combined with a politically inspired need to transfer responsibility for food‐poisoning outbreaks, skew the conduct of investigations and their conclusions. Contends that this is compounded by serious and multiple inadequacies in the conduct of investigations, arising at least in part from the lack of training and relative inexperience of investigators, the whole conditioned by interdisciplinary rivalry between the professional groups staffing the different agencies. Finds that in addition failures to exploit or develop epidemiological technologies has affected the ability of investigators to resolve the uncertainties identified. Makes recommendations directed at improving the performance of the surveillance agencies which, if adopted will substantially enhance food poisoning control efforts.

An interesting address entitled “Food Poisoning, Facts and Fallacies,” was given by Dr. Andrew Rutherford, M.B., F.R.C.P., Lecturer in Pathology, Edinburgh Medical School, before the Edinburgh Rotary Club on September 27th. Dr. Rutherford observed that illness arising from alleged food poisoning had been attracting much notice in the Press, and to judge from current comment there was much confusion as to the facts. Newspaper writers in the last week or two had suggested that these outbreaks were too frequent, had asked the reason why, and had even thrown doubt on the policy of the Ministry of Health in relation to the recent outburst of paratyphoid fever in London. Not only that, but a distinguished chemist had apparently voiced, on this matter, the opinion that the prohibition of boric acid as a food preservative had brought “a definite risk to the community, because it limited the period during which food could be kept free from contamination.” All that was very disquieting, and demanded a clear statement of facts. Certain propositions could be stated straightaway, Dr. Rutherford said, which in his opinion were unassailable. Food poisoning attacks had not been more frequent of late than in former years. There had been actually fewer outbreaks this year than previously, and none at all in Scotland, but they had had more Press publicity. The causes were known and had been known for many years; they were specific disease producing germs which became implanted on food, fresh or stale. The illnesses brought about were neither new nor mysterious to pathologists in general or to the medical advisers of the Government. They had nothing whatsoever to do with the presence or absence of weak chemicals like boric acid as preservatives in food. And no chemist, however distinguished, could competently express an opinion on the broad question of food and food preservatives in relation to disease. That was the domain of physicians, pathologists, and public health experts, not of pure chemists. Referring in a few words to the subject of boric acid and its effect on the system, Dr. Rutherford said that boric acid, after being swallowed was passed out of the body through the kidneys Speaking as a practising physician and pathologist he was not at all sure that the continued swallowing of boric acid in small doses by human beings throughout a lifetime might not have something to do with those kidney breakdowns in middle life which were so damaging to individual health, and which they saw so much of both in hospital and in private practice. This point was not settled yet scientifically. He mentioned it as a caveat. It was known as a scientific medical fact that the prolonged use of food preserved with boric acid might lessen the weight of the body, by interfering with the digestion of the fats that were eaten in the food. The United States and Germany prohibited its use some years ago, following careful studies by medical scientists of its effects on the tissues and organs of the body. After discussing some of the common symptoms of illness caused through food poisoning, Dr. Rutherford said that the accepted idea was that the symptoms were caused by ptomaines—chemical substances produced in the decomposition of foods. They knew now that that notion was erroneous. Actual ptomaine poisoning in man was in fact exceedingly rare, and the vast majority of cases of so‐called food poisoning were due to living specific microbes—not chemical poisons—which in various ways might become implanted on food or drink. Small quantities of boric acid would neither prevent the access of these germs nor kill them if they were present. Intestinal bacteria, and their dwelling‐places, and their disease‐producing properties were then discussed at some length by the speaker. The Aertrycke bacillus was the organism, he said, most frequently met with in food poisoning cases in this country. Aertrycke struck down 703 persons in a British city in 1924. Mostly adult women, they had all eaten cream cakes distributed over the town from a large bakery. The evidence strongly suggested that cream left exposed in the bakehouse over a weekend had been contaminated by mice. The sources and habitats of these food poisoning organisms being understood, it could at once be grasped that infection might be spread in diverse ways without human intervention at all. It was easy to see how meat, veal, or milk might be inoculated with bacillus. It was equally clear that mice or rats might implant the Aertrycke germ on any food they might reach. But that was not all. The healthy human “carrier” was a most important factor in disseminations. Outbreaks of typhoid and paratyphoid—under natural conditions human diseases—were in this country nearly always traceable to “ carriers.” The recent paratyphoid in London was said to be due to cream. That meant in all likelihood that the cream (or milk) at some stage had been grossly contaminated by a human carrier of paratyphoid bacilli. The common house fly played an active part in hot weather in scattering intestinal bacteria about. He also was a “carrier,” but in a different sense. The “filthy feet of faecal feeding flies” were to blame for much illness of a gastroenteritis kind, and one fly could carry enough filth to poison a dozen or two people if it planted it in meat or milk. The position then was that many meats, fresh or not fresh, cooked or not, and drinks, might become charged with poisonous germs, and if the weather were hot, they would multiply exceedingly, cooking of course, was a great safeguard, except perhaps in Gaertner infection, whose poisons were heat resisting. Cold cooked food, of course, might be contaminated. Foods containing preservatives (e.g., sausages, pork pies, etc.), had often been associated with acute gastroenteritis. A preservative might keep food looking fresh and smelling fresh when it really was not. All the time dangerous microbes might be growing in it. Certainly boric acid would keep it “ free from taint,” but in doing so might mask a far greater danger than mere taint and staleness. Generally speaking, food was handled in this country with far too little regard to the possibilities of contamination by poisonous intestinal germs. Much stricter cleanliness than obtains at present was certainly necessary in the handling, storage, and cooking of food. The recent regulations dealing with preservatives tended to lessen and not to increase food poisoning outbreaks. The Meat Inspection Regulations and the Milk and Dairies Acts—irksome at times no doubt to traders—served a similar purpose. Whenever food was kept or cooked the utmost efforts should be made to prevent the access of flies, mice, or rats. Milk should be pasteurised, and cold storage taken advantage of. Employees who handled or cooked in large concerns like bakeries, hotels, restaurants, and clubs should be proved not to be carriers of the typhoid or food poisoning germs before they were taken on. Facilities for the thorough washing of hands—preferably with antiseptic soaps—before handling food, should be ample in all large kitchens. Much, of course, might be provided for in future public health legislation, but it was not his purpose to forecast that. Suffice it to say that the prohibition by the Government of preservatives in food— so far from being wrong or brought about too quickly— was a step in the right direction, and in that they had lagged far behind the U.S.A.—unusual for Britain. It was the sheerest nonsense to suggest that because boric acid or such like was absent food became tainted, and so caused poisoning. Weak boric acid never did and never would prevent infection by virulent germs present in food. If all the food not quite fresh which was daily consumed in the British Isles were poisonous the population would be decimated in one week of hot weather : for warm weather certainly favoured the breeding and spread of the food poisoning bacilli. It was to his mind almost monstrous to insinuate, as had been done widely in some sections of the Press, that the Ministry of Health had done wrong in putting a stop to the doctoring of food by chemicals. It made a detached observer conclude that misguided busybodies had been allowed far too much scope to spread an erroneous notion. For it was tantamount to saying that the scientific advisers of the Government had collectively been either in gross error or over‐enthusiastic; a proposition which was unthinkable.

The harmful activities of microorganisms in foods have been highlighted in recent months with cases of botulism and typhoid and various reports on the increases in food‐poisoning of all types. These increases may be due to a number of factors including the warmer weather in the last few years, the greater use of prepared or ‘take‐away’ foods, and a more casual approach to food hygiene in homes and catering establishments. This article reviews some common causes of bacterial food‐poisoning and the methods of prevention.

Food poisoning remains a major public health problem and 2009 has seen major outbreaks with both financial and social implications. The aim of this paper is to examine whether a business gets the food poisoning it deserves and to assess the role of management including food safety culture in outbreaks.

Factors influencing the likelihood of a business causing food poisoning are considered and discussed using four categories or variables. These are then applied in a case study of an E coli O157 outbreak.

The risk of a business causing food poisoning depends on the types of foods produced, the people consuming the food and where the business sources its raw materials. These need to be considered in relation to the hygiene behaviour of the food handlers employed. Food safety does not happen by accident and to produce safe food consistently, especially on a large scale, requires management. Management includes the systems that are used and the organizational food safety culture of compliance with those systems. Food poisoning will never be totally prevented; however, to a considerable extent, a business does get the food poisoning it deserves.

This paper presents a novel approach to understanding the risk of a business causing food poisoning and will be of use to investigators, food safety inspectors, educators and industry.

The Medical Research Council has issued a special report by Dr. W. G. Savage and Mr. Bruce White on food poisoning, based upon a study of 100 recent outbreaks in this country, most of which have not been previously published. The Report is prefaced by a general survey of the different causes of outbreaks of food poisoning, the epidemiological and clinical features of food poisoning, the paths of infection, and prevention of food poisoning. The report is a continuation of the special investigations of Dr. Savage and Mr. White, published in the Medical Research Council Report No. 91, and entitled “An investigation of the salmonella group, with special reference to food poisoning,” which dealt chiefly with the classification and distribution of the salmonella bacteria. By far the commonest cause of food poisoning in this country is infection of food by living salmonella bacteria or by the toxins of these microbes. Salmonella bacteria multiply rapidly in food without betraying their presence by any obvious decomposition, and they secrete powerful endotoxins capable of resisting temperatures as high as 100° C. In 20 of the 100 outbreaks recorded in this report living salmonella bacteria were proved to be the agents of infection, and in 14 of these 20 outbreaks B. aertrycke was the particular member of the group found. The isolation of these bacilli is a difficult procedure, for they are factidious in their diet, and it is worth while noting, in view of the remarks we make elsewhere about the more thorough investigation of outbreaks of food poisoning, that in 6 of these outbreaks the bacilli were only captured from material obtained at post‐mortem examinations; if this material had not been available the bacterial cause would not have been definitely established, though deductions might, of course, have been made from other examinations. It is well known that food in which salmonella bacteria have grown may continue to be poisonous after the bacilli themselves have been destroyed, because the toxin which these germs secrete is more resistant to heat than are the living cells. Food poisoning by the toxins of the salmonella bacteria alone is perhaps the most difficult of all to analyse, because ingestion of these toxins leaves no specific stamp upon the body tissues: thus agglutinins do not appear in the blood serum. It might be thought that the poisonous nature of the food could be demonstrated by feeding experiments on animals, but this method is not often successful because animals are exceptionally resistant to these toxins. The method of injecting extracts of suspected food parenterally has led to many false conclusions in the past, and does not now command much confidence. A promising new method of study was referred to in Report 91—namely, the possibility of demonstrating toxic properties in food by feeding animals with large quantities, killing the animal nine to twelve hours afterwards, and examining the stomach and intestines for evidence of inflammatory reaction. Another new method which we believe Dr. Savage was the first to employ, at any rate on an extensive scale, is the demonstration of the production of specific agglutinins to the salmonella bacilli through the injection into animals of suitable emulsions of the incriminated food. By one method of investigation or another the authors of this report have satisfied themselves that 17 out of the 100 outbreaks should be ascribed to salmonella toxins. Four of the outbreaks were caused by bacteria of the dysentery group. The chief interest of this observation is that it widens our view of food poisoning, for until recently it would have been denied that bacteria of the dysentery type could cause outbreaks of food poisoning indistinguishable in their clinical characters from salmonella infections. Only one outbreak of botulism—that at Loch Maree—is presented in this series. To summarise the cause of these 100 outbreaks of food poisoning, epidemiological and laboratory investigations, separately or together, provided evidence that 66 outbreaks were due to members of the salmonella group of bacilli, 4 to members of the dysentery group, and 1 to B. botulinus. The remainder were either of definitely chemical origin, or possibly due to some undetected microbe, or were not examples of true food poisoning.

Three events of significance to this country took place in 1899 – the British Food Journal was launched, Australia retained the Ashes, and the Boer War hostilities commenced. If challenged on the order of their importance, cricketers and Empire‐builders may be excused their preference. However, looking at it purely from the standpoint of pro bono publico, the dispassionate observer must surely opt for the birth of a certain publication as being ultimately the most beneficial of the three.

My Lord, in this case, if you brush away—as I invite you to brush away—all the irrelevancies introduced by my friend, Mr. Hume‐Williams, I submit to you with confidence that this case is reasonably clear; but the elaborate argument he has delivered requires me, I am afraid, to repeat what I said in opening, that the only way to approach a case of this kind is to look at the Section of the Statute, and to see what the Section of the Statute was intended to prohibit. I am not going to trouble you with the earlier cases decided under the Food and Drugs Act. I know there have been decisions by the Divisional Court, but they cannot be looked to because the Act under which these proceedings were taken was avowedly intended to meet the difficulties that had arisen in the administration of the earlier Acts. The purpose of the Act is absolutely clear, especially in regard to Section 3, but let me remind you again that this Act contains several different offences, provided with appropriate defences, and guarded by certain specific conditions.

The recent epidemic of food poisoning at Nelson, Lancashire, is an event which is unfortunately not unknown in this country, especially in summer time. It has been said that at least two hundred people have been affected more or less seriously, and that there have been four deaths from acute gastro enteritis. Cases of suspected food poisoning are now in many places compulsorily notifiable to the local authority by medical practitioners to whose notice such cases may have been brought in the course of their practice. As far as we know such notification was not made compulsory before the year 1924, when Wakefield obtained powers under a Corporation Act to do so. A large number of places since that time have followed the lead of Wakefield. Thus among watering places, Cleethorpes, Bridlington, Brighton and Bournemouth; among manufacturing centres, Sheffield, Stoke‐on‐Trent, Bradford, Blackburn, Oldbury, Smethwick, Cardiff and Rochdale have powers of compulsory notification.—Cheap, rapid, and frequent means of road and rail transport has in these days resulted in an enormously increased influx of holiday makers from the manufacturing centres into seaside towns during the summer. Here, then, is a floating population amounting to several thousands. They are at a place that has been freely and emphatically advertised as a health resort. The have come for a “change” in every sense of the word. It is high summer. The weather is hot. The holiday spirit in the air. A very natural result is for people to eat more fruit, ice cream, and fancy dishes than they would ordinarily do. Assume through some mischance there are one or two cases of food poisoning. These are now automatically reported to the local authority, which at once institutes investigations, tries to trace the evil to its source, and check it from spreading. A serious outbreak is a damning catastrophe for the place, and may adversely affect its future for years to come. In manufacturing centres the need for action on the part of the local authority is still more urgent. The danger is perennial. It may easily reach the dimensions of an epidemic in a poor and crowded district. The people are there from necessity not from choice, and there they would have to stay even if the place were swept by cholera. In the County of London notification is compulsory under the London County Council (General Powers) Act, 1932, Pt. II., s.7, which says : “ Every registered medical practitioner, if he suspects that a person is suffering from food poisoning shall notify the Medical Officer of Health for the district.” This section it is pointed out, was drawn up on the lines of the Sheffield Corporation Act, 1928, s.190, one of the main Corporation Acts that insist on notification. There seems indeed to be a growing belief that compulsory notification of food poisoning is desirable in the interests of public health. Processed foods are particularly liable to become sources of infection. Thus the Act just quoted, Pt. II. s.5, states that premises used for the sale or manufacture of ice cream; or for the preparation or manufacture of sausages or potted, pressed, pickled, or preserved meat, fish or other food must be registered with the Sanitary Authority of the district. Under the same section registration may be refused or registration may be cancelled. Many towns have similar regulations. This section of the London County Act is founded on the Exeter Corporation Act, 1928, s.111. The fact that the London County Council have adopted these two regulations that had already been “ tried out ” in two important cities of such widely different interests as Sheffield and Exeter is a good illustration of how closely associated all municipal bodies are in matters connected with public health. Medical Officers of Health and Public Analysts are officers of the Ministry of Health, and the Ministry itself is a clearing house for general information, investigation, and the co‐ordination of statistics. The sanitary authority of, and the medical practitioners in, any given district discharge not only admittedly most important but, as it seems to us, complementary duties. Each has knowledge not possessed by the other. Diagnosis in cases of suspected food poisoning is by no means easy. Time is not on the doctor's side so that the sooner the sanitary authority is notified the better are the chances of being able to trace the trouble to its source and to deal with it— assuming, of course, that it did not originate in some piece of purely domestic carelessness or ignorance. The information acquired may be slight, or even negative in any given case, but in the aggregate a fund of knowledge must accumulate that cannot fail in the long run to be of value. In many cases of suspected food poisoning further investigation has shown that they are not due to food poisoning at all. For instance, in one borough nine cases reported were found to be due to “ dietetic indiscretion ”; in another twenty reported cases were only forms of more or less acute digestive disturbance of the ordinary kind; in another it was found that daffodil bulbs had been eaten in mistake for onions. Other instances could be given. Facts like these would seem to support the argument that compulsory notification is unnecessary, but it is surely better that twenty suppositious cases should be reported than that the circumstances of one real case should escape investigation. In other cases the cause may remain unknown, but as to the seriousness of the matter there can be no doubt. In a recent outbreak in a home for “unwanted” children out of thirty‐nine infants in one dormitory twenty‐seven were attacked, and twenty died in from two to four days from some obscure form of gastro enteritis. Bacteriological examination of excreta and vomit yielded negative results. The high rate of mortality was attributed to the poor physical condition of the children when they were admitted to the institution in which they died. The case is admittedly an extreme one. Another was reported of exactly the opposite character. Twelve cases of undoubted food poisoning were reported, but these were of so slight a character that no action was taken in regard to the circumstances. In general, however, there is no room for giving the benefit of the doubt. The error—even if it may be so called—of reporting what turns out to be a case of indigestion instead of one of food poisoning is an error on the right side. A question arose recently in the House of Commons as to whether it was necessary to retain an Act on the Statute Book when there had been no prosecutions under the Act. It will be remembered that the Solicitor‐General replied that the mere fact that the Act was on the Statute Book had a very salutary effect. As far as it may be possible to draw an analogy it seems that even better reasons exist not only for retaining, but for extending, compulsory notification of cases of suspected food poisoning. Registration and inspection of premises, plant, storage conditions, and the food itself in places where food is prepared and sold is now a general practice in all centres of population. How necessary this is a glance at the Law Reports of this journal will show. The state of the places mentioned in the records of the prosecution was often such as to ensure them being potential centres of food poisoning. Had it not been for the vigilance of the respective sanitary authorities they would have become actively and permanently so. Such prosecutions are comparatively rare having regard to the large number of food shops in existence, but it would certainly be a backward step to cease to register and to inspect.