INAUGURAL MEETING OF BRITISH SECTION 140 applications for membership. Apart from this general guidance, how- ever, he felt that it was incumbent upon the various members of the Society to put forward their own proposals. Ralph G. Harry moved that a committee be formed to consider applications for membership. This was seconded by Edmond Polan and carried unanimously. .The follow- ing members were accordingly elected to the Membership Selection Committee: Ralph G. Harry Frank Arkins Dr. A. W. Middleton Drs. H. W. Hibbott and J. Bather, co-opted members. The co-opted members were elected from the body of the meet- ing, with a view to giving the Com- mittee the broadest possible basis for dealing with incoming applica- tions. Following the unanimous carry- ing of a motion proposed by H. W. Avis and seconded by Dr. S. Gott- fried, to the effect that an Arrange- ments Committee be formed, the following were elected to serve on this Committee: F. V. Wells, E. Polan, and Dr. A. W. Middleton. No other nominations were pro- posed. It was suggested by Dr. Taylor, and agreed upon by the meeting, that Dr. Middleton could usefully act as a liaison between the two committees. Subsequently Mr. Wells was asked by the meeting to continue acting as Chairman until such time as proper elections should take place. The proposal that a time limit be set on the activities of the present committees was put forward by Frank Arkins and heartily wel- comed by all concerned. It was then decided that the members of the committees should give a full account of their activities to a gen- eral meeting within six months and that they should offer themselves for re-election at the end of that period. It was further agreed that the initial subscription fee payable by members of the British Section should be two guineas. The Chairman, in reply to ques- tions from Dr. Hibbott and others, asked the meeting to suggest a tem- porary address for the Society in this country. At the suggestion of Frank Arkins, and with the approval of those present, he agreed that all applications for membership and other correspondence intended for the Society should, for the present, continue to be addressed to him, c/o United Trade Press Ltd., Bride Lane, London, E.C.z[. A warm vote of thanks was ac- corded to Dr. Walter Taylor, for his extreme kindness and courtesy in coming so far to explain the aims and objects of the Society and to assist in furthering its development in this country. E.S. Maurer, toward the end of the proceedings, proposed a vote of thanks to the proprietors and staff of United Trade Press Ltd., publishers of Soap, Perfumery & Cos- metics, for their helpfulness in pro- viding a meeting hall and for the hospitality extended to all those present. The meeting then ter- minated.

BACTERIOLOGICAL AND DERMATOLOGICAL TESTING OF COSMETICS* By Louxs C. BARAIL, M.D. United States Testing Co., Inc., Hoboken, N. •t. TESTING THE multiple char- acteristics and properties of cosmet- ics involves a great number of methods. This is due to the various preparations of cosmetics. For this reason, a complete investigation of a cosmetic consists of determining (1) its harmlessness (2) its purity (3) the value of its preservative agents (4) its germicidal or fungi- cidal value, if any and (5) its performance, and substantiating the claims made by its manufacturer. (1) TESTS FOR HARMLESS NESS The tests for harmlessness can be divided into: toxicity tests and skin irritation tests. Toxicity tests in- dicate whether or not a cosmetic is toxic and consequently dangerous when absorbed normally or acciden- tally by ingestion, when injected in the blood or when absorbed through the skin or mucous membranes. These tests are conducted by in- jecting the products of their ex- tracts either intraperitoneally or intravenously, or by feeding animals a diet in which 10 or 20 per cent has * Presented at the Dec. 3, 1947, Meeting, New York City. been replaced by the cosmetic. It was not rare a few years ago to find cosmetics that were toxic enough to cause death within a few hours. Today this happens ver•y seldom although new cosmetics have been found recently to cause death within less than three days. A toxicity test is not complete if the determina- tion of the minimum lethal dose has not been made. By injecting intra- peri'toneally various amounts of the product it is possible to determine the smallest dose that will cause death of the animals within three days. The safest method consists in obtaining the death of all animals with this dose however, another method called minimum lethal dose 50 consists in seeking the death of only 50 per cent of the animals in- jected. The skin irritation tests should actually be called tissue irritation tests because they do not only in- volve the skin but also mucous mem- branes, the conjunctiva, and other tissues. All cosmetics submitted to us for skin irritation tests are first extracted and injected under aseptic conditions intradermally into ani- 150