INFLUENZA EPIDEMIC

Evening Star, Issue 16988, 10 March 1919, Page 4

INFLUENZA EPIDEMIC

COMMISSION OF INQUIRY".

THE VALUE OF VACCINATION,

[Per United Press Association.]

WELLINGTON, March 10.

Giving evidence before the Epidemic Commission to-day, Mr Hurley, Government Bacteriologist, dealing with the question as to whether the prior use of vaccine would have minimised tire epidemic, stated that when asked during tho epidemic by tho department hia opinion as to the use of vaccine prophylaxis, ho reported on tho Bth of November ot the effect that under tho circumstances ho strongly advised against It. The circumstances were : (1) Auckland was then tho centre of an epidemic of influenza; (2) inoculation would render every individual more susceptible to the disease for an uncertain number of days, and it would bo dangerous for those who wore actually infected but who were showing up to time of inoculation no svmptons of disease; (3) that after inocullation there would bo many severe cases through neglect of medical advice; (4) that there was a scarcity of medical practitioners to inoculate; (5) and that there was a lack of scientific data as to the probability involved by such inoculation before or'during an epidemic. As to tho benefit of influenza vaccina to be used at an uncertain time before an epidemic, this was still a moot point. There was not sufficient evidence to date that the prophylactic use of influenza vaccine during an' epidemic was advisable. The question of prophylactic treatment was in the oxpenmental stage. The technic and dosage wwo still uncertain. There was still influenza in a more or less virulent stage in Now Zealand. Mr Hurley said that no doubt a more virulent strain of influenza was noticed during the epidemic. It had been imported into New- Zealand, sea-borne, and comparatively recently, but when ho could not say. Ho had heard from the department in Auckland ox virulent cases before October 12. He could not say whether they reached the standard of the cases which had occurred subsequently. ' J)t "Watt, District Health Officer, said tho feature of influenza was tho rapid mariner in which it spread from countryto country and from continent to continent. There was no other infectious disease which could compare with it in this respect.