No Occasion for Alarm in Spite of the Laboratory Analysis "There is no-occasion for anyone to be alarmed," said Dr. C. Noel Davis, Commissioner of Public Health, to a representative of the '"'North-China Daily News" on Thursday afternoon, when he was questioned about the seemingly alarming report of the laboratory analysis of the local supply of water, "but there is always during the summer months, to be exercised the utmost caution with regard to drinking unboiled or unfiltered The report states that there were found in 18 of the many samples of water taken from fire hydrants and taps in various portions of the Settlement, large numbers of Coli organisms, which findings indicated a heavy local contamination of a dangerous character. After ithe reports had been made, tHe Department and the Waterworks Company inyedtigated the conditions in the immediate vicinity of these sources which appeared the most malignant and found that, the reason for such results seemed ta come fiom pollution incurred on construction projects near by, and which had got into the mains. The contamination has been definitely algcerttained to bd purely local and that other districts were found to he up ito the normal standard.
"The examinations of the Health Department indicate the efficiency-of the purification by the water company, and it is certain that these contaminationls have got into jthe system after; the: water has passed through the purification beds," continued Dr. Davis. "Were we sure that these external forces could be entirely eradicated, and the water kept to the standard as it leaves the plant, we could for practical purposes drink the water direct from the tap, without cither filtering or boiling, but as the situation now stands, it is necessary to subject our drinking water to either of these sanitary measures.
"The presence of the Coli group does not indicate necessarily a dangerous disease, but their presence does indicate the possibility of {the presence of disease-producing organisms" continued the officer, "and as a matter of fact they might only show the presence of decaying vegetable matter. We have a presumptive' test which is a general one to indicate the presence of any of these, which must be then followed out farther to show the presence of focal or non-focal bacteria, while: a still more exagting test is applied to locate and separate the more recent and therefore more dangerous developmentts."
London announces that Mr. T. Harborne, the former Postmaster of the British Post Office in Shanghai. has been appointed Postmaster at Weymouth,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.