ILLNESS FROM TREES

Evening Post, Volume CVII, Issue 140, 14 June 1924, Page 16

ILLNESS FROM TREES

AILMENTS TRANSMITTED TO

HUMAN BEINGS.

For centuries men have suspected that some at least of tlieij; diseases come to them from animals. ' But that disease should, reach us from plants is ,an entirely new idea—if the.single case of "hay fever" be excepted,' writes a student of medicine in the "Daily Chronicle." Had not very definite proof of its correctness been rorcncoming recently, we should certainly have dismissed it as ridiculous. The first "clue"' in this mystery was obtained when Dr. Lafont discovered, that certain prickly plants occasionally harbour living germ's known as flagellates. These" are minute specks of life possessing long and -very active tails, and , thus, in a way, resembling tadpoles. They lash 'their tails about, and so propel themselves. The next .discovery was that the tailed germe were sometimes eaten by in;e.-ts living on the plants, and that they remained alive in the bodies of these insects, ihat remarkable fact led at o^oe to the question whether some of the germs of disease may not also be "trse-dwel'ers." An answer to it has recently fp^rared in the "Annals of the Pasbjur lnriitute." Dr. Pranchini, who supplies this answer, states that he carried out experiments on the disease known as Kalaazar, or the "black uicknass,'"' arid on one of the so-called trypanosome infections. In both cases he found that the germs in question could be "cultivated" on the prickly plant on which the tailed germs were first discovered—in short, that both these germs are tree-dwellers. The importance of the . discovery in connection with Kala-azar lies in the fact that this disease is enormously prevalent in India, where, in past years, ib used to sweep away thousands of lives. X There is strong suspicion that it is carried from patient to patient by .parasites. But no one has been able to explain how the, parasites themselves become infected in the first instance. .-Again, it is known that the best way to rid a native village of this plague is to remove it bodily to a fresh locality. If Dr. Frahchini is right, the explanation may be that when the bushes and shrubs surrounding a village are infected, insects will also become infected, and thus carry the infection to human beings. SonTe of our home ailments tend to break out at certain times of the year, and only at these times. In view of the discovery of these tree-dwelling germs, it may well be that such outbreaks correspond to the flowering or fruiting seasons of particular plants.