Tuberculosis.

Timaru Herald, Volume XIIC, Issue 13828, 13 February 1909, Page 4 (Supplement)

Tuberculosis.

THEORY MAINTAINED. At the International Congress on Tuberculosis, held at Washington, D.C., during the last week of September and the first fortnight of October, Professor Koch reiterated the views with which he startled the British Congress in 1901. What makes the latest utterance specially significant is that it embodies results at which he has arrived after giving consideration to the published reports of the British. Royal Commission, and to all the criticism to which his previous conclusions were subjected. The conclusions of 1901, which are now c-onfirmed by the professor, are —(1) That the bacilli of bovine tuberculosis are different from the bacilli of human tuberculosis; (2) that human beings may be infected by bovine bacilli, but serious disease from the cause is rare; (3) preventive measures should, therefore, rather be directed against the prorogation of human tubercle bacilli. He proceeds -to criticise in detail some of the methods of the British Commission, and he puts emphasis on two possible sources of error. Special care must be exercised in the separation of animals inoculated with bovine tuberculosis obtained from man. and under the belief that one is dealing with the human form of the disease. The other source of error arises frcm the possibility of mixed infection occurrin"- from human and bovine tuberculosis. Professor Koch siunm.ins°s the situation to-day under sis parAll fcompetent investigators agree that the tubercle bacilli of the human subject and the tubercle bacilli of the bovine .-biect differ from one another. They should be desi<mated the typus humanus and the typus bovinus. (2) The U Irercls bacilli' of the human type Ere virulent to guinea pigs, slightly , virulent to rabbits, and almost non-viralem; to cattle. (3) The tubercle bacilli or the fcovine type grow very slowly, md are of equallv high virulence to guinea pigs, rabbits, and cattle. (4) S» i»r as .Professor Koch knows, he br-illi of the bovine type have r yer be-on demonstrated in cattle. (5) he < - til l of the bovine type .can occur in man. Thev have been found in the cervical lvmph glands and at the intestinal tract. With few exceptions these bacilli are but slightly "inile"* lor man. and remain localised. (6) Eleven twelfths of those who die f-oni tuberculosis die from its pulmonary ■ '.r consumptive form. If the is. -ts v.itn reference to the identity of the two forms of tubercle bacilli are s <• j.ime-. bv Koch's opponents, he asss vl.v t.o thev not look for evidence n ibe eases which form eleven twelfths -t whole rather than in ie which form only one-twelfth if n.e whole. He maintains that, '.» i« date, in no case of pulmonary ii>'v-i----cnlosis has the tubercle bacillus h. < a definitelv demonstrated. -f -'ri'^ fore reiterates his 1901 thesis ■:- - •.• ■>■ we must direct our- loi combating tuberculosis bv a.. "«•» primarilv against the tuber-Ie l-eilli of the human typo.''