The Reshta Worm.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 878, 28 December 1888, Page 10

The Reshta Worm.

A correspondent whose interesting letters on Central Asia are appearing in The Times, gives the following account of the Reshta worm. * One of our excursions into the bazaar was made with Dr Heyfelder for the purpose of seeing the operation of extracting the Reshta worm from the afflicted natives. This worm (Filaria medinensis) is the scourge of Bokhara, and is simply the result of the filthy water and insanitary condition of the town generally. There is another prevalent disease called the Afghan plague, or Sart disease, which breaks out in sores on the face, and I believe is one of the forms of so-called leprosy, but the reshta is much more disagreeable and common. No one can drink raw water in Bokhara with impunity, and among the Russian residents the samovar teaurn is boiling all day long.; As Dr Heyfelder says, it is a parasite taken in dirty drinking-water, which, after nine to eleven months’ development in the organism, finds its way into the subcutaneous and muscular parts of the body in the form of a Jong, milkywhite, and rather elastic worm. In autumn and winter the water is seldom dangerous; but in summer the city of Bokhara is reeking with stagnant pools and basins where the water, filled with the living germ of this reshta, is used indiscriminately for bathing, washing, and drinking, with the lamentable result that it is a rare thing to meet a Bokharan who has not been attacked. They seem to think that water cannot be impure if prayed over and used for religiouß ablutions. Europeans who do sometimes drink the water, are believed to escape the disease through the alcohol and other strong things which they imbibe, and which probably destroy the germ. At Samarcand' it is hardly known at all, and at Kermine it is rare. It only be-comes-more prevalent as the Zerafshan river nears the capital, thus proving that its origin is in this city and nowhere else. The worm generally appears under the skin like a strong vein in the legs, arms, or back, and is accompanied with itching. Its head, which is hard and pointed, pierces a small hole and then gradually comes out of

itself when fully developed. It is not unusual for a .man to go to the barbers, who act as the extractors, with the worm half hanging out of his calf. Sometimes it dies under the skin and causes gangrene. Dr Heyfelder once applied certain antiseptics to the wound made by the head, and after the patient had rested twenty-four hours the worm came out without further assistance. Many persons have two or three reshtas every year, and they may have ten to twenty in different parts of the body at one time. They often put the feet and legs in cold water in order to send the worm' up higher 1 . Not a single case, however*, X am told occurred among the Russian soldiers and workmen employed in building the railway, owing to General Annenkoff’s strict orders that they were not to drink the Zerafslran water, and to the supply of a number of Pasteur filters. We saw a number of men operated upon in the barbers’ shops in the bazaar. They sat or lay down on the floor while the barbers cut the skin with a sharp razor, and after probing about with a small piece of wire, and finding the head, they carefully drew the worm out by constant massage of the flesh around the wound. If the worm coils itself under the skin it may be tied into a knot and then the operation becomes very painful. I watched some experiments made on this vermicular parasite by Doctor Heyfelder in the Embassy with the aid of the microscope, which were very interesting. Being evidently oviparous, every drop of fluid pricked from the body .of the adult worm contains mjuiads of minute living copies of the parent. The effect of several chemical solutions were tried upon these minute organisms, and they generally revived aftei some time. Some lived for twenty-four and others as long as fortyeight hours after being put under the lens.’