MYSTERIOUS DISEASE

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXXI, 16 December 1937, Page 6

MYSTERIOUS DISEASE

BABIES DYING IN CHICAGO NEW YORK. sth December. Physicians arc working frantically to save the lives of eight infants suffering from a mysterious epidemic . which has already killed -10 babies in SI. Elizabeth Hospital. Chicago. 1 One baby was cured and returned home to its overjoyed parents to-day, \ I but another, which was born at the 1 hospital 19 days ago. was rushed back j 10-night in a dying condition. This has I aroused fears in dozens of homes that other babies born at St Elizabeth’s, and afterwards sent home, may yet become victims of the disease. which has j puzzled medical authorities for sever!a! years. The complaint has been diagnosed as ! acute diarrhoea, and is believed lo be traceable to virus which is invisible ; under (he microscope. Autopsies have revealed strange changes in the brains of (he liny victims. Parents of surviving infants are haunting the hospital corridors, imph *!ng doctors and nurses to save their babies. •MYSTIFIED BY REPORT MELBOURNE. 6th December. I Members of the medical profession m Melbourne confessed that they were mystified by this report. They stated that they had never heard of an epidemic among newly born infants. They pointed out that mostly diarrhoea was not due to a virus, and in any case was g icrally merely one of the symptoms of other disorders. In addition, it was stated, primary d ; rrhoea did not affect the brain. 1