CURE FOR CONSUMPTION.

Waikato Times, Volume 98, Issue 15320, 22 August 1923, Page 5

CURE FOR CONSUMPTION.

SPAHLINGER’S TREATMENT.

A FOUR YEARS’ PROCESS. SERUM AND VACCINES. Received August 22, 11.30 a.m. LONDON, August 21. A remarkable article in the Dait-j Express show's the risk of loss to the world through Dr. Spahlinger’s impoverishment. The Daily Express sent its special correspondent, Mr Philpott, to Switzerland to investigate the Spahlinger tuberculosis cure. Mr Philpott cables from Geneva a tong account of the process, which requires infinite patience and extensive resources. Dr. Spahlinger’s achievement is based ou theory, but unlike other bacilli which produce toxins as waste matter, tubercole bacilli produce theirs omy as a means of self-defence when attacked. Mr Philpott describes- four years’ processes as necessary to produce the serum, beginning with the innoculation of guinea pigs and ending with the painless Weeding of horses. I)r. Spahlinger has discovered 32 different kinds of toxin. At the end of the third year he isolates these deadly varieties. Only one poison must be injected into the same horse; therefore lie must have a minimum of 22 horses for the preparation of one type of the specific. When the horses-are Wed it results in 22 different kinds of partial sera, which together make the complete serum.

In reality, however, the scrum, although it brings an advanced case back to life, is less important than the vaccine which bolh cures and prevents further attacks. According to Dr. Spahlinger, an advanced case restored by serum is on .the same plane as a ■less advanced case, for which the serum is unnecessary. That is 1 where the vaccine is utilised. Dr. Spahlinger extracts from the tubercle bacilli all its compotent parts, and injects them one by one into the patient. The first series of injections trains the defensive power of the patient to destroy that particular component; the second and third scries set up defensive power against other components, and so on, until the patient’s organism is itself trained to produce its own antidotes and achieve complete resisting power. Thus the serum, by eliminating the poison, enables the broken down defences to reestablish themselves, and the vaccine gives these re-established defences the victory. Dr. Spahlinger thinks he could reduce tuberculosis by 90 per cent bv vaccination. ,He is now experimenting with cows to discover flow long immunity vaccination gives. Dr Spahlinger has given the cows enough -tubercule to kill a township. Periodically one is killed and an autopsy made, yet in no case has the presence of the tubercule bacilli been discovered. Dr. Spahlinger, owing to impoverishment, has been obliged to sell some of his cows and horses, so the work lags, and even partial sera and vaccines are becoming less.