§ SIR F. CHANNING (Northamptonshire, E.)To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether any inquiry has been, or will be, made by the Home Office into the circumstances attending the death of William Howe, woolcomber, in the employ of Messrs. Roper, of Lavenham, Suffolk, who died on 1st August, 1907, of anthrax, stated to have been caused by sorting horsehair; whether horsehair imported from abroad is disinfected under the regulations; whether horsehair produced in Great Britain has also to be disinfected; whether he is aware that several cases of fatal anthrax have occurred among animals in the immediate neighbourhood since the death of William Howe; and whether he will take steps to secure by regulation or otherwise more effective disinfection of materials, whether of foreign or British origin, and prompt and complete destruction of all matter and refuse from factories or warehouses suspected to be of an infections character.
798 (Answered by Mr. Secretary Gladstone.) Full inquiry was made at the time into circumstances of this case. The question of the risk of anthrax to workers in horsehair has been under my consideration, and regulations were made by me last December under Section 79 of the Factory Act—to come into force on 1st April next—which will require all horsehair from China, Siberia, and Russia to be disinfected before undergoing any manipulation other than opening and sorting, and special precautions to be observed in opening and sorting. These are the only kinds of horsehair the risk from which is so great as to call for special regulations. In the case of horsehair of British origin the risk is very slight; of 1,322 animals attacked by anthrax in this country in 1906, 36 only were horses, and under the Anthrax Order of 1899 the carcase of every animal affected or suspected to be affected by anthrax is required to be burned or buried. I am informed by the Board of Agriculture that an outbreak of anthrax occurred in the immediate neighbourhood of the factory in question very shortly after the death of William Howe, affecting three horses; in future, under the new regulations, all dust collected from the opening and sorting screens, where China, Siberian, or Russian hair that has not been disinfected is opened or sorted, will require to be burned.