ANIMAL DISEASES.

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXV, Issue 18616, 11 July 1930, Page 2

ANIMAL DISEASES.

ADDRESS AT VETERINARY CONFERENCE. Last week, the annual conference of the New Zealand Veterinary Medical Association was held in Wellington. Proceedings were opened by the Minister of Agriculture, after which, the president (Dr Reakes), delivered an address in which he reviewed the work done by the veterinary profession during the previous year; a number of instructive and suggestive papers were then read and discussed, and a day was spent at the veterinary laboratory, where a number of bacteriological, biochemical and other demonstrations, all of an interesting and helpful character, were made. The first paper read was that contributed by Mr A. M. Paterson, of Timaru, who dealt with the fundamental causes' of animal diseases. Mr Paterson conteilded that, contrary to general opinion, bacteria were not the primary cause of disease, but that, several antecedent causes had to be brought into operation before bacteria were capable of successfully invading the animal body. He went "on to say that, an incessant struggle for supremacy had been going on between body cells and bacteria, since life first appeared on the planet, and that the body cells must of necessity ha\o proved victorious, for otherwise not a single representative of the animal kingdom could possibly have survived. “During this age-long contest,” Mr Fataerson said, “the animal body gradually evolved two lines of defence against bacterial attack; one to prevent infection, and another to promote recovery - from disease, and to confer some degree of immunity on the convalescing subject. So long as the first or outer line of defence remains intact, it is practically impossible for infection to take place, except by such bacteria as the body cells have had little or no experienct of. The question, then, whether an animal shall become the victim of a microbial disease, is no longer the question, whether it shall be exposed to infection. or even the question whether bacteria shall find entry into its body. Tf - is the question rather, whether the animal has vigour enough to produce counter poisons in proper quantity to neutralise bacterial toxins, to inhibit the movements of bacteria and to I check their multiplication; and whether it is capable of summoning phagocytes in sufficient numbers and of such vigour as to successfullv ward off the attack. From this it wlil be seen that, in a previously healthy animal, the first step towards a bacterial disease is a lowering of vitality with a consequent weakening of the body defences. In farm animals, enfeeblement of vitality usually results from malnutrition: and the commonest cause of malnutrition is a deficiency of vitamines and minerals in the food supply; and these deficiencies arise cither in soil impoverishment or in the mismanagement of stock during certain months of the year. Although our soil may be deteriorated, probably to a disease-en-gendering degree, we know that it is not yet quite impoverished, for our animals thrive well when at grass, a fact which proves that they receive a sufficiency of both vitamines and minerals. which an impoverished soil could not supply. Soil impoverishment may therefore be ruled out as a cause of these deficiencies in this country. There is therefore only the question of food mismanagement to be considered. As our stock do well during the grassgrowing season, it must be after the ' grass goes off that our food mismanagement begins. When the grass 1 has gone, we feed with such glass substitutes as we can procure; and the question is: Are they deficient in those substances which we have seen are so essential to health and vigour? The answer is that in most cases they are deficient in both vitamines and "food minerals. Take iodine as an example. lodine is known to exert a powerful influence on glandular activity and on general nutrition, and. in grass there.. is three times more iodine than in our grass substitutes, except grain and green feed. And, if this one mineral is deficient to this degree, we can safely assume that most of the other eleven minerals essential to perfect nutrition, are also deficient. From autumn to spring these deficiencies are continued: and, it is at this season that our dairy cows and ewes require more and not less, of these essential substances, for, at that time they are passing through their gestation periods when they have to nourish two bodies instead of one. This glaring disruption in our food cycles is quite sufficient to account for the existent and continuance of those diseases that are at present taxing the ingenuity of the veterinary profession in all parts of the world.

“That, at this season of the year, our farm animals are practically starved of vitamines cannot be doubted.” concluded Mr Paterson, “for most of the grass substitutes given them do not contain vitamines in sufficient abundance, if at all. And without a sufficiency of all the vitamines, health, growth and reproduction are certain to become impaired. We have. I think located the forerunners of many of our most serious stock diseases. Thp question now is: What are we to do to rectify the errors which have been pointed out? We cannot afford any longer to side-track ourselves by searching for the mysterious while overlooking the obvious. Perhaps the speediest way of arousing all those concerned to a sense of their responsibility would be to appoint a Royal Commission to inquire into the whole ma* ter. This in itself would be an educative process of the highest ojder; and it could not fail to put farmers on the right track. To continue drifting as we are doing will lead to still greater losses than we are now experiencing: and loss on our farms end extravagance in our cities will quickly •take us down the broad road to national ruin.”