Nutrition and Health

By Sir Robert McCarrison, MD

Summary: Dr. Robert McCarrison, the famed British nutrition researcher knighted for his work in India (which culminated in the classic nutrition textbook Studies in Deficiency Disease), gives a lecture to London schoolchildren about diet and nutrition. He recounts his famous rat-feeding studies mimicking the diets of differing populations in India and, based on the results of his studies, gives his prescription for a basic healthful diet: freshly milled grains, raw milk and milk products, legumes, fresh vegetables, fruit, eggs, and meat. Delivered at the Royal Institution, London, 1937. Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research reprint 43.

[The following is a transcription of the original Archives document. To view or download the original document, click here.]

Nutrition and Health

Lecture to London schoolchildren, May 1937.

In this lecture I want, if I can, to make you understand what nutrition means and why it is that health depends upon it.

Structure of the Body

If you were asked what your bodies are made of, you would probably say, “Of flesh and blood and bones.” Yes! But of what are these—and other parts of them—made?

It may surprise some of you to be told that they are made up of countless millions of minute organisms, called cells, and of the fluid in which these cells live, this fluid being composed of water and nutrient materials. The existence of the cells depends on this fluid, for from it they obtain the materials needed for their nourishment and to it they transfer the waste products of their activities. It is derived mainly from the blood, which, in a continually moving stream, carries food and oxygen to the cells and removes their wastes. Just as “a flowing stream brings to the simple organisms fixed to the rocks of the streambed the food and oxygen needed for existence and carries away the waste,” so do “the same conditions prevail for the incalculable myriads of cells that constitute our bodies…” (Cannon).

Picture to yourselves these multitudes of cells, cells of many kinds—blood cells, bone cells, teeth cells, muscle cells, gland cells, nerve cells, skin cells—each one of them a living, actively working unit of the body. Each intent on its own job; each with a structure peculiar to its kind; each fixed in its own place in the body; each dependent for its existence, its structure, and the efficiency of its function on food, oxygen, and water being brought to it and on the food so brought being of a kind suited to its use; each dependent too on the fluid medium in which it lives being kept constantly purified, so that it may not be poisoned by its own wastes and those of its neighbors.

Picture these myriads busy as bees in a hive, forming themselves into the different parts of the body; growing, multiplying, and thus increasing the size of their own parts of the body and of the body as a whole; ceasing to grow when the limits of growth, set by heredity, have been reached. Their wisdom is amazing, and their ways are wonderful to see. Nowadays, we can see them, for we can culture them outside the body in suitable nutrient fluids and watch them under the microscope. I shall never forget the first time I thus saw them. I had made cultures of cells from a certain gland, and as I watched them—for hours at a time—growing, multiplying, and working, I seemed in imagination to hear a busy murmuring amongst them, as though they were saying, “We must form ourselves into our gland; we must, we must, we must!”

Carrel tells us that when he has cultured blood cells, whose duty it is to carry oxygen to all parts of the body, they actually have formed for themselves vessels in which to flow. They seemed to know that without the vessels in which to flow they could not get on with their job. So they set about making vessels from the materials provided in the nutrient fluid surrounding them.

Think of the wonder, the beauty, the order, the wisdom, and the purposefulness of it all. And think too that all this depends on the proper composition of the fluid medium in which the cells live, on its containing everything they need for their proper structure and the proper performance of their function and on its being constantly kept free of the waste products of their activities. It is to these ends that nutrition—the most important of all functions of the body—is directed.

“Nutrition,” then, may be defined as the sum of the acts or processes by which the myriads of cells that constitute our bodies are nourished. It consists of the taking in and assimilation through chemical changes of substances with which the cells—and the organs and tissues they form—are built up and their wear and tear repaired; by which the cells’ processes and those of the body as a whole are regulated; and from which energy is liberated for the cells’ work and that of the body they constitute. The purpose of nutrition is thus to ensure that the body is properly constructed in all its parts and that it function efficiently.

Now, “health,” or, rather, good health—for, as you know, health may be good, bad, or indifferent—is that condition of the body in which all its parts are properly constructed and functionally efficient. It follows therefore that the purpose of nutrition is to ensure good health so far as it can do so. You will notice that I say “so far as it can.” This is because there are other factors in addition to nutrition that influence health, though none are so important. But nutrition, like health, may be good, bad, or indifferent; and as it is one or the other, it influences health for good or for ill accordingly.

Substances Needed for Nutrition

The substances with which the function of nutrition is effected are 1) oxygen, which is present in the air we breathe 2) water, of which the greater part of our body is composed 3) food, which plants, under the influence of sunlight, produce for us out of the earth and air, and 4) a substance formed in the skin of our bodies by the action of sunlight. Air, water, sunlight, and food—these are the instruments of nourishment; nutrition is the act of using them.

Processes of Nutrition

The acts or processes involved in nutrition are many.

First and foremost, there is breathing, by which, during inhalation, air is taken into the lungs and oxygen absorbed from it by the red cells of the blood, and by which also waste gases are expelled from the body, during exhalation.

Second, there is the circulation of the blood, which, driven by the pumping action of the heart, carries oxygen and nutriment to every cell in the body.

Third, there is the drinking of water, which forms nine-tenths of the blood and of the fluid medium in which the cells live.

Fourth, there is the chewing, the swallowing, and the digestion of food, by which the food is split up into its component parts and made ready for use by the cells of the body.

Fifth, there is the absorption into the bloodstream from the digestive tract of the products of digestion, and the evacuation by the bowels of the food residues and waste products of digestion.

Sixth, there is the control of vital processes by substances derived from the food or manufactured by certain glands in the body.

Seventh, there is the assimilation by the cells of the nutriment conveyed to them by the blood—that is, the cells’ conversion [of the nutriment] by chemical changes into substances identical with themselves.

Eighth, there is the discharge of the waste products resulting from these chemical changes by the lungs and kidneys.

And, finally, there is the burning up of certain food materials (“fuel foods”), with the production of energy for the work of the body—work that includes all these [aforementioned] acts or processes as well as growth of the body and bodily movements such as we make in walking, playing, or taking exercise.

Nutrition depends on all these acts or processes. Disturbance of any one of them disturbs it and, if severe or long continued, leads to ill health. For instance, if for any reason we do not get enough fresh air, then we do not get enough of the oxygen needed for the chemical activities of the cells that constitute our bodies. The sum of these activities makes up, as it were, “the fire of life.” And just as an ordinary fire will not burn properly without a proper draught of oxygen-containing air, neither will the fire of life. It too needs an abundant supply of oxygen to keep it burning briskly. Hence the great importance to nutrition of abundant fresh air and proper breathing.

Many children do not breathe properly through the nostrils, as they are intended and should be instructed to do. They should have breathing exercises and a“nose-drill” every morning, the former to inflate the lungs properly and remove from them stagnant air, the latter to keep the nasal passages clear. There are all sorts of nooks and corners, passages, and cavities in and around the nose that tend to get stopped up unless air is made to pass freely through them. If not kept clear by proper breathing through the nostrils, they are apt to become infected and to cause much discomfort or even suffering.

Now, as the chemical activities of the body proceed—or, to continue my simile, as the fire of life goes on burning—gaseous and other waste products are formed, just as smoke and ashes are formed by an ordinary fire. These must be got rid of; otherwise, the fire will become choked, and the cells of the body poisoned, by their accumulation. The waste gases are taken up by the red cells of the blood—after those cells have given up their load of oxygen to the tissues—and are carried to the lungs, where they are discharged into the air.

The other waste products, dissolved in water, are passed out of the body by the kidneys. This is one reason why it is so necessary to drink plenty of water. There are other reasons, but here it is only necessary to say that water is the very fount of nutrition. For it is the vehicle that conveys essential nutrients to all cells of the body, the medium in which the cells’ chemical activities take place, and the solvent in which their wastes are discharged from the body.

During these chemical activities, a certain amount of water is formed as a by-product. But in addition to this, and in addition to the water contained in all foodstuffs (three-quarters by weight of a potato is water, for instance), more than a quart of water a day—as such or in beverages—needs to be taken if nutrition is to be normal. Many people drink far too little water, and in consequence nutrition is interfered with, and health suffers sooner or later. It is a good plan to drink a glass of water first thing in the morning and last thing at night as well as between meals, whether you are thirsty or not. Water keeps the inside of the body clean just as it does the outside.

Things That Disturb Nutrition

The next important thing in nutrition is food that must be of a kind that supplies all the other materials needed for the growth, repair, and work of the body and for the regulation of its functions. Presently, I shall tell you what the right kind of food is. But here I want to remind you that nutrition may be disturbed not only by the wrong food but by the imperfect chewing of food, by sloppy foods that are swallowed without chewing, [and] by poor digestion and the imperfect action of the bowels or constipation.

The proper chewing of food is important because it exercises the jaws and helps keep the gums, the teeth, and the mouth healthy, and because it starts off the processes of digestion, by which food is split up into its component parts and made ready for use by the body. Failure to chew the food properly disturbs digestion at its very outset.

Even more important is the proper action of the bowels. Constipation is often a sign that the food is at fault and that nutrition is or soon will be at fault. But it is sometimes a sign of carelessness. It is very easy to be careless and fall into bad habits about emptying the bowels regularly. You may be late for school or something distracts your attention, and so you neglect this very important duty of ridding your body of the waste products of digestion. I want you to realize that the regular and healthy action of the bowels is essential for proper nutrition and health.

Nutrition may also be disturbed by insufficient rest and want of sleep. Rest, as you know, is necessary to recovery from fatigue. During sleep there is a slowing down of all vital processes; the bodily engine, as it were, just “ticks over.” Without this periodic reduction of its activities to a minimum, it would tend to wear itself out. Sleep, and plenty of it—a child of twelve years old should, for instance, sleep for about eleven hours out of the twenty-four—is particularly necessary during childhood, when the body has so much work to do in growing and when children, during waking hours, are hardly ever still. In these days of rush, bustle, excitement, and noise, many children get far too little sleep, and in consequence their nutrition and health suffer, especially if they are improperly fed, as is often the case.

Worry and emotional excitement, infections of various kinds, want of sunlight, and lack of exercise are other factors that disturb nutrition, for they impair the vitality and working capacity of the cells. Proper exercise of the body is particularly important, for not only does it induce muscular strength, agility, and beauty of form, it also promotes the circulation and purification of the blood. It is nutrition’s great assistant—but an assistant only. For without proper nutrition, the full benefits of physical exercise cannot be obtained. When, as is soon to happen, physical training becomes part of your everyday lives, you must take care so far as you can that your nutrition is not faulty.

Food, Physique, and Health

Before telling you what is the right kind of food to eat, I will tell you of some experiments I carried out in India; for I hope that their results may help you realize how important food is for physical fitness.

India, as you know, is a very large country, with a population of about 350 million people, made up of many different races, each race having its own national diet. Now, the most striking thing about these races is the way in which their physiques differ. Some are of splendid physique, some are of poor physique, and some are of middling physique. Why is there this difference between them? There are of course a number of possible causes: heredity, climate, peculiar religious and other customs, and endemic diseases. But in studying the matter it became evident that these were not principal causes. The principal cause appeared to be food.

For instance, there were races of which different sections came under all these [aforementioned] influences but whose food differed. Their physiques differed, and the only thing that could have caused them to differ appeared to be food. The question then was how to prove that the difference in physiques of different Indian races was due to food.

In order to answer, it I carried out an experiment on white rats to see what effects the diets of these different races would have on them when all other things necessary for their proper nutrition were provided. The reasons for using rats in experiments of this kind are that they eat anything a man eats, they are easy to keep clean, they can be used in large numbers, their cages can be put out in the sun, the round of chemical changes on which their nutrition depends is similar to that in man, and a year in the life of a rat is equivalent to about twenty-five years in the life of a human being—so that by using rats one gets results in a few months that it would take years to get in man.

What I found in this experiment was that when young, growing rats of healthy stock were fed on diets similar to those of people whose physique was good, the physique and health of the rats were good; when the rats were fed on the diets similar to those of people whose physique was bad, the physique and health of the rats were bad; and when the rats were fed on diets similar to those of people whose physique was middling, the physique and health of the rats were middling. Good or bad physique, as the case might be, was therefore due to good or bad diet, all other things being equal.

Furthermore, the best diet was one used by certain hardy, agile, vigorous, healthy races of Northern India. It was composed of freshly ground whole wheat flour, made into cakes of unleavened bread, milk, and the products of milk (butter, curds, buttermilk), pulses (peas, beans, lentils), fresh green leaf vegetables, root vegetables (potatoes, carrots), and fruit, with meat occasionally.

Now, in my laboratory I kept a stock of several hundred rats for breeding purposes. They lived under perfect conditions. Cleanliness, roomy cages, good bedding, abundant fresh water, fresh air, and sunlight—all these things they had. And they were fed on a diet similar to that of a race whose physique was very good. They were kept in stock from birth up to the age of two years—a period equivalent to the first fifty years in the life of human beings.

During this period no case of illness occurred amongst them, nor death from natural causes, nor maternal mortality, nor infantile mortality, except for an occasional accidental death. In this sheltered stock, good health was secured and disease prevented by the combination of six things: fresh air, pure water, cleanliness, sunlight, comfort, and good food. Human beings cannot of course be so sheltered as these rats were, but the experiment shows how important these things are in maintaining health.

Diet and Disease

The next step was to find out how much of this remarkably good health and freedom from disease was due to the good food—food consisting of whole wheat flour cakes, butter, milk, fresh green vegetables, sprouted pulses, carrots, and occasionally meat with bone to keep the teeth in order. So I cut out the milk and milk products from their diet or reduced them to a minimum; I also reduced the consumption of fresh vegetable foods, leaving all other conditions the same.

What was the result? Lung diseases, stomach diseases, bowel diseases, and kidney and bladder diseases all made their appearance. It was apparent therefore that the good health depended on the good diet more than on anything else and that the diet was only health-promoting so long as it was consumed in its entirety—so long, in fact, as it contained enough milk, butter, and fresh vegetables. Many more experiments were done, which showed that when rats or other animals were fed on improperly constituted diets—such as are habitually used by some human beings—they developed many of the diseases from which these human beings tend to suffer.

Diseases of the bony framework of the body, of the skin covering it, and of the membranes lining its cavities and passages; diseases of the glands whose products control its growth, regulate its processes, and enable it to reproduce itself; diseases of those highly specialized mechanisms designed for its nourishment, the gastrointestinal tract and the lungs; and diseases of the nerves—all these were produced in animals under experimental conditions by feeding them on faulty human diets.

Here is an example of such an experiment. Two groups of young rats of the same age were confined in two large cages of the same size. Everything was the same for each group except food. One group was fed on a good diet, similar to that of a Northern Indian race whose physique and health were good, the composition of which was described above. The other group was fed on a diet in common use by many people in this country, a diet consisting of white bread and margarine, tinned meat, vegetables boiled with soda, cheap tinned jam, tea, sugar, and a little milk—a diet that does not contain enough milk, milk products, green leaf vegetables, and whole meal bread for proper nutrition.

This is what happened: The rats fed on the good diet grew well (Figure 1), there was little disease amongst them, and they lived happily together. Those fed on the bad diet did not grow well (Figure 2), many became ill, and they lived unhappily together—so much so that by the sixtieth day of the experiment the stronger ones amongst them began to kill and eat the weaker, so that I had to separate them. The diseases from which they suffered were of three chief kinds: diseases of the lungs, diseases of the stomach and intestines, and diseases of the nerves—diseases from which one in every three sick persons among the insured classes in England and Wales suffers.

[Photo of large, healthy-looking rat, with caption:] Figure 1. Rat fed from an early age on a good diet, consisting of whole wheat bread, butter, milk, pulses, fresh green vegetables, and carrots, with a ration of meat and bone once a week. Compare with Figure 2.[spacer height=”20px”] [Photo of small, sickly-looking rat, with caption:] Figure 2. Rat of the same age as that in Figure 1, fed from the same early age on a bad diet, consisting of white bread and margarine, tinned meat, vegetables boiled with soda, tinned jam, tea, sugar, and a little milk. Compare with Figure 1. (See original for images.)[spacer height=”20px”]

It may therefore be accepted as an axiom that the greatest single factor in the production of good health is the right kind of food and the greatest single factor in the production of ill health is the wrong kind of food.

Diet for Health

Now as to the right kind of diet. If you have followed me so far, you will have realized that it is the kind of diet on which certain hardy, agile, vigorous and healthy races of India live; the kind of diet on which my healthy rats lived. It is, too, the kind of diet which, within the last year or so, has been recommended by the Technical Commission appointed by the Health Committee of the League of Nations to formulate the nutritional needs of the human body. And it is the kind of diet recommended, within the last few weeks, by the Advisory Committee, appointed by the Minister of Health and the Secretary of State for Scotland to inquire into the faults of our national diet and to suggest means to rectify them. There is therefore no longer any doubt as to what the right kind of diet is. It is one made up of the following eight classes of foodstuffs:

  1. Whole or lightly milled cereal grains; whole wheat flour and the bread made from it or standard bread or bread containing the germ of the wheat and a proportion of the outer skin of the wheat grains; rye bread; oatmeal; semolina
  2. Milk and the products of milk: cheese, butter, skimmed milk, curds, and buttermilk
  3. Pulses: peas, beans, and lentils
  4. Fresh green leaf vegetables, such as spinach, lettuce, watercress, cabbage, parsley, turnip tops, nettle tops, and young dandelion leaves
  5. Root vegetables, particularly potatoes, carrots, and onions
  6. Fruit, both fresh and sun-dried; with fruit may be included the tomato
  7. Egg
  8. Meat, including glandular organs such as liver; fowl; and fish, particularly the herring

It is on diets made up of the first six of these—with meat in moderation or only as a luxury—that the vigorous, hardy, healthy races of Northern India live. And it is on diets made up for the most part of these that you must live if you wish to be vigorous, hardy, and healthy and to remain healthy.

These foodstuffs do not differ in kind from those we use in this country. Where we go wrong is in the way we use them and in the things we do to them before using them. We make our wheat into white flour, instead of into wholemeal [whole-wheat] or lightly milled flour, thus depriving it of important nutritive substances—substances needed amongst other things for efficient nervous and muscular action and for efficient blood formation.

We do not drink nearly enough milk, and we neglect to use such excellent foodstuffs such as skimmed milk and buttermilk. Many of us eat far more meat or other animal food than we need. We do not eat nearly enough fresh green vegetable foods in the form of salads, nor enough fruit. We boil our vegetables in water and throw the water in which they are boiled down the sink instead of using it as food; and often we add soda to it, which destroys some of the nutritive substances in the vegetables. And perhaps worst of all, we eat far, far too much sugar, which has no body-building substances in it at all.

It is this inordinate use of sugar, sweets, and sweet cakes that is so bad for children. It ruins their teeth and spoils their appetite for more nutritious foods. If you have money to spend, do not spend it on sweets; spend it on fruit or a glass of milk or both. There is no harm in sugar taken in moderation at meals, especially when it is taken in the form of natural brown sugar, black treacle, or honey. What does the harm is the munching of sweets between meals and the finishing up of meals with sweet things.

There is another difference between the hardy, vigorous races of Northern India and ourselves. They live in a country where sunshine is abundant the whole year round; we do not. So it is necessary during the winter months, when sunshine is scanty, to make up for the lack of it. Fortunately, this is easy to do by taking cod liver oil, which contains the substance that sunshine produces by its action on the skin.

One often hears complaints that people cannot take cod liver oil. This is usually because they take more than a teaspoonful. This dose, taken once a day, at the end of breakfast and followed by a piece of dry bread, is enough, and the advantages derived from taking it are great. Cod liver oil contains iodine, which is necessary for the health of a gland in the neck called the thyroid. This gland sometimes swells because there is not enough iodine in the diet, causing goiter.

“Protective Foods”

By this time you may be asking yourselves, “What is it that makes these eight classes of foodstuffs the right ones from which to construct our diets?” From what I have told you, you will have realized that food has two great functions—the first to supply materials needed for the construction of the body, for the maintenance of its structure, and for keeping the mechanism of the body in proper running order; the second to supply materials that provide energy for the work of the body. In accordance with these two functions, the foodstuffs available for our use are divisible into two great classes: 1) those rich in materials that subserve the first function and 2) those rich in materials that subserve the second.

The first class includes the “protective foods,” so-called because they are rich in substances—proteins, mineral salts, and vitamins—that protect the body against disturbance of its structure or functions, that is, against disease—for disease is disturbance of structure or functions of organs or parts of the body. The principal foodstuffs of this class are milk and its products, green leaf vegetables, wholemeal bread, potatoes, and fruit, though the other three of the eight classes of foodstuffs aforementioned have protective qualities also.

To the second class belong the “energy-yielding foods,” or fuel foods, so-called because they are rich in substances—starches, fats, and sugar—that provide energy for the work of the body. Included in this class are the cereal foods—flour, bread, rice, barley, oatmeal, and so on; the fats, such as mutton fat, beef fat, bacon fat, butter, margarine, and vegetable oils; and sugar, either as such or in honey, treacle, and sweet things generally. Meat too is an energy-yielding foodstuff, though of an extravagant kind. Many of these, if rightly chosen, are protective as well as energy-yielding.

It is because the eight classes of foodstuffs I have mentioned are both protective and energy-yielding that they are the right ones from which to make up our diets, and because they form complete diets when properly combined. The great secret of food and nutrition is to eat these foodstuffs as nature provides them, and the fresher the better. This is not to say that they should not be cooked, but that [those that] are cooked should be cooked in a way that does not destroy their health-promoting properties.

In this country everyone or nearly everyone gets enough energy-yielding foods: bread, sugar, fats, and—except in the very poorest—enough meat. But many people do not get enough of  “the protective foods,” particularly milk, fresh vegetables, and wholemeal bread. Their diets are therefore incomplete, and they are incomplete in a direction that results ultimately in disorder of structure or function of organs or parts of the body, that is, in disease.

It is as though motorcars were given enough petrol but not enough of the things—oil and grease, for instance—needed to keep their mechanisms in good running order. You can well imagine what is bound to happen in these circumstances, how soon the cars would begin to creak and rattle, to rust and wear out; how soon, in short, they would become diseased. It is much the same with human beings who get enough “energy-yielding” but not enough “protective” foods.

Soil and Health-Giving Foods

In this lecture I have said little or nothing of calories, mineral salts, proteins, vitamins, or other chemical constituents of food about which you may have heard or read. I have done so purposely. For this is an introduction to the subject of food, nutrition, and health, and those who want to learn more about the chemical constituents of food and the parts they play in nutrition can do so from the books I mention below.

What I want you to learn from this lecture is that it is the foodstuffs themselves that matter to you, rather than any chemical ingredient of them, [specifically] the foodstuffs that I have mentioned in the list given above. These, when properly combined in the diet, supply all the food essentials known and unknown, discovered or undiscovered, that are needed for normal nutrition—provided they are produced on soils that are not impoverished.

For if they be produced on impoverished soils, their quality will be poor, and the health of those who eat them—man and his domestic animals—will suffer accordingly. Man is literally created out of the earth, since it is the earth that supplies, through the agency of plants, materials out of which he is made. If, therefore, he is to derive all the benefits that the earth is so ready to yield to him, he must employ his intelligence, his knowledge, and his labor in rendering it fit to yield them to him.

In this country impoverishment of the soil goes on apace because we take out of the soil, in the form of crops, more than we put into it, in the form of animal and other organic manures. This impoverishment leads to infertility of the soil, and this in turn leads to a whole train of evils: pasture of poor quality; poor quality of the stock raised on it; poor quality of the foods this stock provides for man—meat, eggs, milk; poor quality of the vegetable foods he raises for himself; and, faulty nutrition, with resultant disease in plants, beasts, and men.

Out of the earth are we, and [out of the earth are] the plants and animals that feed us created and made; and to the earth we must return the things whereof we are made if it is to yield again foods of a quality suited to our needs. There is in this country at the present time no greater need than that, by proper care and cultivation of our soil, we make ourselves self-supporting in the health-giving foods, particularly milk, garden vegetables, and potatoes. Unfortunately, it would seem that we cannot grow all the wheat we need for bread, but we can at least turn the wheat we do import—as well as the wheat we grow in this country—into wholemeal or lightly milled flour, using the bread make from it instead of the denatured white bread now in almost universal use.

There are few greater services that anyone can render to his country and his fellow men than to devote his or her energies to the cultivation of the soil. The production of these foods in such abundance that they will be within the means of everyone is a task that lies before the younger generation, and I hope that some amongst you who have listened to me today may devote yourselves to it and adopt one of the greatest of all professions: that of agriculture.

Those of you who have the opportunity should take up the cultivation of kitchen gardens or allotments in your spare time. It is a health-giving pastime, health-giving not only on account of the exercise of your bodies but because of the fresh foods you produce for yourselves and relatives. There will be no doubt that without the greater production, the cheapening, and the more even distribution and use of the foodstuffs I have mentioned, our people cannot attain to that perfection of physique that is their birthright.

[Books cited by Dr. McCarrison:]^ [spacer height=”20px”]

1. Teaching of Nutrition to Boys and Girls, by M.S. Rose.
2. Food, by R. McCarrison.
3. The Foundations of Nutrition, by M.S. Rose.
4. Food Values at a Glance, by V.G. Plimmer.

By Sir Robert McCarrison. The Gabrielle Howard Memorial Lecture, Royal Institution, London, May 25–26, 1937. Reprinted by the Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research. 

Reprint 43
Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research
Milwaukee, Wisconsin  53233

Note: Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research is a nonprofit, public-service institution, chartered to investigate and disseminate nutritional information. The attached publication is not literature or labeling for any product, nor shall it be employed as such by anyone. In accordance with the right of freedom of the press guaranteed to the Foundation by the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, the attached publication is issued and distributed for informational purposes.

 

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