INFLUENZA.

Press, Volume LV, Issue 16522, 14 May 1919, Page 7

INFLUENZA.

MORTALITY IX SYDNEY. (By Cril«.—Pre«» Association-— -Cop* right.) (Auitralifl-u and K.Z. Cable Association^ SYDNEY, May 13. The influenza deaths to date total 1070. DOMINION FIGURES. The Hon. G. "W. Russell, Minister of Public Health, yesterday supplied a "Press" representative with tho following influenza figures for the period Bth to 12th of May. Total for Dominion, 64 cases, made up as follows:— Auckland district 17, of -which three in Auckland City are severe, and also one in Whakatano. Wellington district 12, of which two at Waipawa are severe, and one in "Wellington City. Nelson district: Throe fall mild). North Canterbury: Fourteen mild and three pneumonic. South Canterbury: Four mild and two severe. west. Coast: Buller hospital district, two mild. Otago: Two mild and one severe. "WELLINGTON DISTRICT CASES. (PRESS ASSOCIATION TELEGRAM.> WELLINGTON, May 13. Between May Bth and 12th, 18 cases of influenza wore reported in the Wellington health district, located as under: —Waipawa, two pneumonic; Napier, two mild; Eltham, two mild; Marton, one mild; Wellington City, throe mild, one severe; Lower Hutt, two mild; l-'eatherston, two mild; Motueka, one mild ; Nelson, two mild. THE MANUKA'S CREW. ANOTHER DEATH. (press association telegram.) WELLINGTON, May 13. Another member of the crew of the Union Company's steamer Manuka— John Wall, 2S years of age—died on Somes Island to-day. This is the fifth daath since the vessel's arrival. There are only three patients left on the island, two of whom are convalescent. 'Hiere have been no fresh cases since May 3rd. THE RESTRICTIONS- IN SYDNEY. (from our own correspondent.) .

SYDNEY, May 5. The influenza epidemic remains much about the same—2o deaths and 100 cases reported per day. The Hoalth authorities, however, by elaborate calculations, say that the epidemic is stoadily on the wane.

The average citizen is not greatly concerned about it. What he wants to know is how much longer the maddening mask must be worn in trams and trains, and how much longer Sydney is to be like a city of the dead, with theatres and all kinds of public entertainments forbidden. The average citizen also points to the fact that for weeks past Melbourne, with absolutely no restrictions, has had almost exactly tho same number of deaths and cases as Sydney, where a most elaborate system of restrictions is operating. People from Melbourne say that, over there tho " 'flu" is hardly mentioned, and they aro amazed to see what Sydney is doing. The people are becoming very restless. "The City of Dreadful Fright" was the neat heading on the hill-board of a weekly paper on Friday. The loss to Sydney week by week is enormous. The Government is spending thousands every week in maintaining employees thrown out of work as the' result of the restrictions.

Public opinion, two or three months ago, was emphatically against Victoria, because Victoria would adopt none of the N.S.W. restrictions, and laughed at N S.W. To-day, public opinion admits freely that Victoria was right, and it is turning savagely against the Government which stubbornly persists in a course that experience has shown to bo useless and unnecessary. The restrictions will probably be removed this week.

ANOTHER BORDER FARCE. The farces which are daily enacted at the borders of tho Statos as a result of the attempt to bar out influenza, continuo to grow and multiply. The latest funny story comes from Texas. Texas is on the border of New South Wales and Queensland, but is on the Queensland side. All the farmers in a considerable section of New South Wales thereabouts do their business with Texas, and got their supplies there. Queensland says that there shall be no communication with New South Wales, except subject to a long period of quarantine. But those farmers still do most of their business with Texas, under quaint conditions. The lowlevel bridge which connects the two States is the rendezvous of buyer and seller. In the .contre of the bridge three logs are laid, with 10 feo£ between each. Those without telephones advanco to the nearest log on the N.S.W. sido, and shout across their order for meat, bread, grocorios, etc., and there is someone generally waiting on the nearest Queensland log to transmit the ordor. When the goods are brought, thoy are carried to the central log, and the bearer retires within tho sacred Queensland barrier. After ho is safely hack, the man from N.S.W. ndvancos * and secures his purchase. Two or three policemen aro constantly in at.tendnnce to see that this procedure is observed.

This farce is solemnly performed, daily and hourly, although there is not a case of influenza within hundreds of miles.

TRACKING THE GERM. Remarkable results of experiments by a group of workers in Franco in tiacing tho influenza germ are given by "Tho Times" medical, correspondent. A melancholy interest attached to tho discovery in the respcct that one of tho party, . Major H. Graeme Gibson, R.A!M.*C., died from the disease almcsfc at tho moment when the work had been completed. Tho report of tho three workers —the late Major Graeme Gibson, Major Bowman (Canadian Army Medical Corps), and Captain J. I. Conor (Australian Army Medical Corps)—deals with tho animal experiments carried out in order to subject the new germ to the most searching investigation pcssiblo. Tho animals used were baboons, Macacus rhesus monkeys, rabbits, guinea pigs, and mice.

These wore inoculated with the sputum and blood of infected persons, i.e., persons suffering fr-om influenza. In all those animals disease signs similar to those met with in human cases were produced._ The first series of experiments was with sputum which was collected as a rule early in tho disease. In the case of monkeys, 80 per cent, of the experimental inoculations with filtered sputum produced the disease when the nr.itum had been taken From cases of influenza before the end of the' third dav of disease. Sputum taken at a later date gave le>s positive results. "Control" animals were infected with sputum from oases of ordinary acute bronchitis. Quite different pictures were produced. Here, then, was a piece of evidence to show that the cansc cf influenza was to be found in the sputum of infected persons and thnt it ivaof u chnnicter so small as to pass through the pores of a bacterial filter, that is to Fav, that it belonged to tho class of futerablo or filter-passing germs, and not, as does the Pfpiffar's bacillus, tp tha of

organisms which cannot pass th => bacterial filter. 2(jrm ca n The committee find that■ & g from, be grown by the Nocucl ® (b) (a) the kidney of infected (c)'the the filtrates of lung tissue; and filtered sputum from cases of third The cultures were carried to tne generation by direct culture. _ tures when inoculated into an n „^ e^za< »» duced typical ' <cx P er ' me r n 6^vor ed again and cultures could be from the animils so inoculatea- conThese are very strong sidering this gorm the actual j the influenza ep'dem'c; in^ee< \_ l rDnbe difficult to"imagine anv n vincing evidence to this ettect.