Brewing Production

BREWING PRODUCTION. The raw materials in brewing production are barley, hops, water, and yeast. The production processes in brewing are divided into 4 main groups: 1. The transformation of barley into malt (to form the enzyme diastase) is carried out in the malt house. Here the barley is cleaned of dust, sorted, soaked in steeping tanks, piled in heaps and left until the grains sprouts reach a certain length; after this, drying occurs, during which the temperature is gradually brought to 60-80°. The resulting malt is cleaned from sprouts and stored in special rooms. 2. The next operation is wort preparation. The malt is ground, mixed with water in mash tuns, and heated - the starch of the malt under the influence of diastase turns (not completely) into maltose or glucose, which are capable of fermenting. The resulting "wort" after adding hops is poured onto "plates" - large flat vessels where the wort cools; then it is run into cooling apparatus where its temperature is reduced to 4-5°. 3. The further process is wort fermentation, for which yeast is added to it. Fermentation takes place in two stages: first in fermentation cellars for 1-2 weeks in open wooden tanks at a temperature of about 5°, then for 1-3 months occurs secondary fermentation in barrels in cellar storage rooms. 4. The finished product is mechanically (with the help of liquid CO₂) poured into bottles (or barrels) in special washing-filling departments; here bottles are washed, filled and sealed. The main professional hazards in different departments vary. In malt houses, workers have to work in conditions of significant air dustiness (in Kazan in the elevator room 29-65 mg of dust was found in 1 m³ of air) and high temperature in dryers; in the latter, in the absence of mechanization - heavy physical work (mixing). In the apparatus department and especially in the fermentation department, meteorological conditions attract attention - here work is done at low temperatures (according to Leningrad surveys in the apparatus and cooling departments 7-8°, in fermentation 4-7°), high relative air humidity (90-100%) and contamination with a large amount of CO₂ released during fermentation (2-3% was found in Leningrad plants); in the fermentation department, work usually takes place with insufficient artificial lighting - 1-4 lux (there is no natural light here). In washing-filling departments, usually low air temperature (7-15°) with high relative humidity (80-100%); due to sharp fluctuations in water temperature and bottles washed in it, poor quality of glass and corks and other factors, bottles very often burst, resulting in high injury rates among workers in these departments. For barrel sealing, various resinous substances are used, for example, a solution of rosin (or other) in trichloroethylene, so poisoning cases (Beintker) are possible here. One of the greatest evils of brewing production is the systematic consumption of large amounts of alcohol by workers. This issue receives very serious attention from all old authors who dealt with this problem: they point out that due to the custom existing in breweries to give workers a certain number of bottles of beer on hand ("Deputat") the consumption of the latter by workers reaches colossal sizes, and this circumstance explains the large number of accidents and specific morbidity observed among workers in brewing production. The number of accidents and mainly their severity completely do not correspond to the actual danger of brewing production: accidents occur not so much due to the presence of particularly dangerous machines and installations, but due to 1) non-compliance with elementary safety precautions in such conditions as hatches, walkways, stairs and others, 2) due to the constant presence of workers in a state of intoxication. In this regard, old data are interesting: in Germany in 1892 per 1,000 brewing workers there were 13.45 serious accidents per year, while in the mining Westphalian region - 9.84, in Bavarian woodworking plants - 11.35; thus brewers ranked first among all professions; in 1902 per 1,000 workers of all German industry there were 9.2 serious accidents, among brewers - 11.9. In 10 breweries where in 1904 the beer ration was replaced by monetary compensation, the number of accidents immediately decreased significantly: in 1900 there were 18.1 per 1,000 workers, in 1903 - 18.3, and in 1904 - 12.7. In recent years, the distribution of beer to workers has been abolished in many plants, but nevertheless its consumption is still quite significant: Beintker points out that on German plants workers drink 5-8 liters of beer daily. According to data from the Leningrad Institute of Occupational Diseases, workers in fermentation and storage departments drink 5 or more bottles of beer per day. Data on morbidity and mortality also indicate that here the specific role is played not by specific professional hazards, but by alcohol consumption. While information on the specific effects of professional hazards (low temperature, increased humidity, CO₂) is almost absent in the literature, statistical data from Germany, England and other countries indicate the predominance among brewers of diseases characteristic of "alcoholic" professions. For example, according to English data for 1910-12, the mortality rate of the entire working population aged 25-65 is 11.13 per 1,000, for alcoholic professions (innkeepers, catering staff and brewers) - 17.13; the latter has a predominance in all the most important groups of diseases, but especially sharply in the number of causes of death, cirrhosis of the liver and alcoholism stand out: for the first we see for the entire working population 0.19, for alcoholic professions - 1.22; for the second, the corresponding figures are 0.05 and 0.40; the actual mortality from these two diseases is 6 times higher than theoretically calculated. Interesting data were obtained when studying brewing workers in the USSR: in Leningrad (Institute of Occupational Diseases) when comparing several professional groups (brewers, bakers, rope makers, fighters, ursol workers), brewers showed the highest figure for blood pressure and the largest number of cases of heart hypertrophy with disturbance of the autonomic nervous system on the basis of alcoholism; in Kazan; when studying gastric juice of 170 brewers, deviations were found in 50%: in 36.4 - subaciditas, in 7.6 - anaciditas, in 4.7 - achilia; the author (Pleshchitser) considers the consumption of beer to be the cause. Health measures. In malt houses - complete mechanization of work for mixing and moving barley and malt (already introduced in a number of plants); in apparatus and fermentation departments - mechanical cooling of wort using refrigeration machines and ventilation of the premises to remove CO₂, ventilation of tanks before "draining for cleaning, improvement of lighting; in washing-filling departments - mechanization of production processes, standardization of bottles and corks, etc. For constantly damp clothing and footwear, special dryers should be arranged. It is extremely important to carry out among workers intensified sanitary-educational work to combat alcohol abuse, since only prohibition usually does not give positive results.