BUBONIC PLAGUE.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 821, 19 May 1910, Page 6

BUBONIC PLAGUE.

A CASE AT AUCKLAND. NO NEED FOR ALARM. To a Dominion reporter yesterday the Hon. D. Buddo (Minister for Public Health) stated that a case of infectious disease at Auckland had just) been diagnosed as bubonic plague. Mr. Buddo went on to say that the patient had been employed in a laundry where material from different ships was being dealt with. According to the Minister, the pationtf is' progressing satisfactorily, and all contacts are being carefully watched. No further developments, he added, were expected. Statement by Prime Minister. Speaking io a reporter last night, the Prime Minister said that he believed that there was no occasion for alarm. Tho patient, a man, was reported to be progressing very favourably. From information to hand, it appeared that the material handled at the lanndry in question came from vessels running to and from Sydney, Sir Joseph added that tho patient had been under closa supervision for some days! PREVIOUS CASES IN DOMINION. EIGHT DEATHS: TWO RECOVERIES. This is 'the eighth occasion on which an outbreak of bubonic plague, has taken place in New. Zealand. In this connection it may bo noted that, each time, Auckland has been the locale 06 its appearance. The first occurred in June, 1900, when a man was suddenly seized with pains over the lower part of tho body; sickness followed, gradu-. ally increasing drowsiness and apathy, and the development of swellings. A. doctor who was summoned suspected that the disease, was plague, but it was not. until three days later that ha felt justified in notifying the case as plague. Upon ' the evening when the notification was made, the victim died. The post-mortem revealed inter alia about 20 spots on the upper part of tho chest, shoulders and face, like inflamed flea bites, and without any secretion of pus. Cultural and other experiments in connection with the fluids from a bubo by Mr. Gilruth, one ;of the General Health Commissioners for the Dominion, Dr. Beaumitz, of the Pasteur Institute, and others, showed that' the disease was identical with bubonic plague. Nono of the "contacts," fortunately, developod tho disease. Plague-infected rats were afterwards found in various parts of tho Dominion', but more especially at Auckland. Owing to the continued presence of plague in the other colonies, stringent internal precautions wore then taken throughout the Dominion against the disease.

Tho next outbreak occurred at Auckland in April, 1002, when a man, whilst working unloading on tho s.s. To Anau, was seized with severe pain in back and groin, and vomiting. He returned homo to bed, and olevon days later died. It appeared that deceased had, just prior to contracting the disease, worked on a number of vessels. In May of 1902, a young mail residing and working in tho city of Auckland died of tho dread disease. No connection could bo traced between his work, 1 which was that of sorting kauri gum, and exposure to infection from Australian shipping or imports. The disease in this case was only' detected by post-mortem bacteriological investigation. Two months later another Auckland resident was attacked by plague. Ha seemed to have had no direct: connection with tho N.S.W. shipping, but waa about the wharves. Tho disease was of the pneumonio typo, and also proved fatal. Rats wero bacteriologically, examined from time to time with nega* tivo results. The next case occurred in Auckland in June, 1903. When taken to tho hospital tho ■ patient was suffering, from high temperature and a large axillary bubo. He had been employed in a printing offico, and had been handling bales of paper on some of tho intercolonial boats. It was remarkable that the only, case, occurring in Sydney at tho time was also an employee in a pristing office. A portion of the affected gland was excised, and bacteriological investigation revealed the presence of the . bacillus pestra. After a protracted illness of 143 days tlio patient made a good recovery." No infected rats wero detected. Four cases of suspected plague were notified in Auckland in 1904. Of these two wero diagnosed as bubonic plague. One of the victims, a young man who suffered from the abdominal form of the disease, died. It appeared that ho had helped to ■ remove 16 to 20 dead rats from the cellar of a Queen Street warehouse. As ho had eaten his food with unwashed hands, tho medical opinion was that the virus had probably gained primary entrance by tho gastrointestinal tract. In the othor case tho patient made a slow recovery. Ho was a storeman who had handled dead rats, one of which was plague-infected. Two suspected cases occurred in Auckland in 1906, and one in 1907, but subsequent diagnosis did not support the earliei suspicions. In May, 1903, two young women died at Auckland of plague of tho septicemic type. Both victims were employed in'the same building, one occupying a position on the floor almost immediately above the other, and a ra-fc which had died of plague was found in the building. During the same week there was, it is interesting to note an outbreak of plague among rats on a coastal Steamer carrying bonedust transhipped from a ship recently arrived at Auckland from Calcutta.

PREVENTIVE AND PAUUATIVE, Dr. J. Ashburton Thompson, president of the New South Wales Board nf Health, who fought tho plague in Sydney in 1900, again in 1902, and more or less ever since, has laid down that the fundamental data acquired in his investigations at Sydney were: — (D Thai tho epidemic spread of plague occurred independently of communication of tho infection from tho sick; consequently the infection of plague spread bv means which was external to num. ' (2) That the plague rat was harmless to man, but was nevertheless tho essential causo of epidemics. (3) That tho intermediate agout between rat and man (and between rat and rat) was tho flea. Tho infection of man was usually contingent on his being within buildings together with plaptue. rats, and tho rendering of such buildings ratproof was absolutely the most important item in plague prevention, and even the only one out of tho wliolo number to which the epithet "preventive" could b« justly applied. Attention was ' concentrated, however, on other measures which seemed to be more direct, but which, in reality, were merely remedial, or nearlv palliative. The administrator faced by an outbreak of plague was perfectly right in relying on immunisation of'the people—a possibility laid open to liini by the genius of Mr. Ilatfkino—on evacuation, and on the destruction of rats. These methods wero remedial, not preventive; and consequently they wore interminable. If a population were immunised this year it"mat, if It were reinvaded, be apt in imnumed in a twelvemonth or a little later; evacuation night have to bo npeated even during tho s;vne season; and to the killing of rats there was literally no end at all. But. every building \Wiieh was rendered inaccessiblo to rats might be regarded as a fortress impregnable to that enemy (or ever.