WORSE THAN USELESS

New Zealand Times, Volume LIII, Issue 12470, 11 June 1926, Page 5

WORSE THAN USELESS

DP SMALLPAGE’S T.B. SERUM DEATH ACTUALLY HASTENED. By Telegraph.—Press Assn. —Copyright. MELBOURNE, June 10. In the House of Rejrresentatives, Sir Neville Howse (Minister for Health), announced that interim reports on Dr. Smallpnge’s anti-tuberculosis treatment had been received from five States. The reports generally were unfavourable, and spoke of aggravated symptoms resulting from the use of the serum. There was not one report expressed the opinion that the patients had materially benefited from the treatment. Sir Neville said that the Commonwealth Laboratory experiments showed that the disintegration and fragmentation of tubercle bacilli did not occur after tlie treatment with splenic extract, and that there was no evidence of any lytio principle in the splenic extract.

ANIMALS TREATED

Guinea pigs, artifically infected with human tubercle bacilli, were divided into two groups, one group treated and the other group kept as controls, in which the disease was allowed to develop normally. All the treated animals were dead, lie said, while the control animals were still alive. Some rabbits infected with bovine tubercle bacilli were similarly divided into two groups. Some were treated by different methods approved by Dr. Smallpage, while others were kept as controls. The treated animals died more rapidly than the controls. The acting-director of the Laboratory, in a summary, said that tlie results indicated that neither the serum nor the extract had been of the slightest avail in saving the lives of guinea pigs infected with human tubercle bacilli. On tlie other band they indicated that death was hastened by the use of those agents.