BACTERIAL BANDITS

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXI, Issue 18590, 28 December 1934, Page 13

BACTERIAL BANDITS

TRACKING THEM DOWN

N.Z. SUPPORTS AN EMPIRE

“C.1.D.”

WAR ON ANIMAL DISEASES

(From a Special Correspondent)

LONDON, Nov. 20. Animal diseases of all kinds are the biggest single drain on the Empire s wealth. Our livestock yields annually far more than our mines; yet, though we can put barbed wire fences round the mines to guard against theft, wo cannot find a barrier which will keep the worst stock thieves out of our Hocks and herds —the germs of disease. Veterinary officers, armed with the weapons of science, have established an efficient patrol which prevents tho disease criminals from breaking through eu masse and wiping out millions of animals at one fell swoop, as they used to do when rinderpest and anthrax (for instance) raged unchecked, but they cannot stop smash-and-grab raids from bacterial bandits or hold-ups by virus gangsters which cause the farmer constant anxiety and loss.

But I have just been shown, in a quiet corner of Surrey, a C.I.D. for the Empire which has been set up to keep a watch on the activities of these costly criminals, and to study and co-ordinate the latest devices for thwarting their evil doings. At Weybridgc, about 20 miles front London, is flic Imperial Bureau of Animal Health —supported partly by New Zealand funds—whose- job is to collect the latest information about animal diseases from all over the world, and to pass it on quickly, in a condensed form, to research workers all over the Empire. It is an organisation for helping the New Zealand and other Empire veterinary officers to keep abreast of the most up-to-date methods and results of research, and it is supported entirely out of Imperial funds.

WIIAT THE BUREAUX DO

New Zealand and the other Dominions and Colonies pay an annual subscription into a central pool, totalling about £20,000 a year, from which eight of these bureaux are financed. Each bureau deals with a different branch of agricultural science and is located at a different research station in Britain, tho director of research being in each case director of the bureau. All the bureaux happen to be in Britain, but this is merely a matter of convenience; library facilities, for instance, are probably more complete than they are elsewhere. Also a considerable part of thejmreaux’s work is to obtain and translate foreign papers on research, and it is easiest and quickest io do Ibis from a European centre.

The Imperial Bureau of Animal Health is located at the British Government’s veterinary laboratories at Weybridgc. The director is Dr. W. Horner Andrews, M.11.C.V.5., and Mr. W. A. Pool, M.R.C.V.S., is deputy director. It is a clearing house 'of information for all animal diseases.

Suppose, for example, that a hitherto unknown disease of cattle breaks out m New Zealand and there is some doubt about its diagnosis. A full description of the symptoms is sent to the Imperial Bureau, .which is requested not, of course, io diagnose the. disease, but to let New Zealand know whether a similar sickness lias been recorded from other parts of the world. The bureau looks up the literature for 30 years back in a dozen, languages, and where necessary sends out. circular letters to various authorities. It collates all the information and replies, let us say, that very similar outbreaks- were reported from Uruguay in 1894 and from the Belgian Congo in 1923, and that .the conclusions reached were so-and-so. This- helps the New Zealand Veterinary Department in planning out its defensive measures against the disease.

MYSTERY OF THE VAMPIRE BATS

This, of course, is a hypothetical case, but something of the sort did occur last year. A mysterious and fatal disease, attacking both animals and human beings, broke out in Trinidad. Botulism was first suspected, but later medical authorities thought it might be a form of rabies carried by vampire bats—although the symptoms were different and dogs were not affected. The help of Hie bureau was enlisted, and an exhaustive search of the literature on a disease possibly transmitted“by bats was made. A similar outbreak was found to have occurred, many years back, in Brazil/ and this epidemic, also, had been traced to vampire bats. This evidenCe confirmed the bat theory in Trinidad, and the authorities were enabled to take steps (o check the outbreak. Officers of these bureaux are probably the greatest readers of periodicals in the world—but not of the sort of periodical one reads on a railway journey. The bureau’s stall 1 at Weybridgc read over 600 scientific journals a year. Every important paper in these is abstracted for a monthly “Veterinary Research Bulletin” issued from Weybridgc, and sent to every veterinary officer in the Fmjfire, who is thus kept in touch with the latest results. LINKS WITH NEW ZEALAND

In Now Zealand, Dr. 0. M. Hopkirk, of the Department of Agriculture’s veterinary laboratory at Wallaceville, Wellington, is official correspondent to the bureau, which he keeps informed about the latest New Zealand work. By means of eminent official correspondents in every contributing country, the bureau has woven a spider’s web over the. whole Empire. Whenever a useful discovery is made in any country, the essential facts about it are caught, like a fly, in the web, and the spider sitting in the centreI—the 1 —the bureau—hears the news. In this way information is passed on quickly and accurately so that the whole Empire benefits. The veterinary research service of each Dominion and Colony is thus strengthened by being able to draw upon the experiences of other countries grappling with the same problems. The Bureau of Animal Health recently noticed, from unpublished reports, that one of the British Columbian veterinarians, Dr. Bruce, was working on a disease called bovine linematuria. which was also being studied in Australia and in India. It consequently wrote to all tliesei stations and put them into direct touch with one another.

BUREAU AS A TOURISTS’ AGENCY Overseas research workers who visit Europe use the bureau as a sort of tourist’s agency. Dr. Horner Andrews and Mr. W. A. Pool, the deputy director, advise visiting veterinary workers on the most interesting research stations, both in Britain and on the Continent, to go and sec, and put them in direct touch with thei leading scientists on this side with whom they might iiko to confer. Several New Zealanders have already tatvi advantage of these facilities. An elaborate map on the walls of the bureau’s headquarters shows at a glance, by means of colored flags, the location of every veterinary college and laboratory in the world. Another activity of the bureau is to organise Imperial veterinary conferences, one of which has. already been held. One of the bureau’s most ambitious