Report of the glass workers' cataract Committee

The selection by a Department Committee of the Home Office in 1906 of diseases which should be added in the Third Schedule of the Workmen's Compensation Bill, 1906, brought into prominence the occurrence of “a form of cataract, commencing in the posterior cortical region of the lens, almost peculiar to persons exposed to the glare and heat” from the furnaces used in glass blowing. The details of this disease at that time available were well summarised in a Report to the Home Office by Dr. T. Morison Legge, H. M. Inspector of Factories (1907). The Secretary of State wrote to the President of the Royal Society (Lord Rayleigh), asking “whether elucidation of the physical and physiological problems involved could properly be made the subject of an enquiry by a Committee of the Royal Society” (April 7, 1908). The Council of the Royal Society thereupon appointed a Committee “to enquire into and report on the physical and physiological problems involved in the disease known as Glass Workers’ Cataract” (June 18, 1908). The Committee consisted of Sir W. Abney, Sir Clifford Allbutt, Dr. H. K. Anderson, Prof. J. Rose Bradford, Dr. G. J. Burch, Sir W. Crookes, Messrs. Marcus Gunn, E. Nettleship, J. H. Parsons, and Dr. A. D. Waller.