162
Indian Species of Brucella
of the agglutination test for brucellosis until the far-reaching revelations of the Mediterranean Fever
Commission [1905-07] an ever-growing number of reports were published of undulant fever in India.
TABLE VI
Comparison of the virulence of Indian and European strains
Strains
Indian M . . . . . . . . . . .
Indian CO 2 A/M*.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Indian CO 2 A . . . . . . . . . . .
McEwen's CO 2 A†
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Bacterial dose
4×10 9
5
5
4
4
2×10 9
5
4
2
2
1×10 9
4
2
0
1
0.5×10 9
4
1
1
0
Numbers=dead mice out of 5
* Average of 3 Indian village A/M strains
† Average of 4 of McEwen's abortus strains (CO 2 sensitive and virulent), Priestley and McEwen [1938]
A=Br. abortus M=Br. melitensis A/M=Br. abortus/melitensis CO 2 =CO 2 —sensitive.
It is indeed remarkable that with the crude facilities and techniques of those times, investigators
were apparently able to isolate what seemed to be the causal organism with ease and certainty, e.g.
from 11 humans in Multan and Ferozepore [Lamb and Pai, 1906], and from goats also in Feroze-
pore [Froster, 1906]. Concurrently, numerous serum-positive cases of typical fever were described
from all over India and a perusal of the contemporary journals forces the conclusion that undulant
fever was enzootic in certain military cantonments, with the inference that the Punjab at least was
widely infected. What is more, a scrutiny of the records cannot fail to convince the critical that a
gram-negative, CO 2 -insensitive, cocco-bacillus, agglutinable by Brucella-specific serum, was being
isolated. This, together with the fact that CO 2 was not required at isolation, is an indication that the
species concerned was melitensis. On the other hand, agglutination reactions were generally weak,
and demonstration of infection in animals was infrequent and confined to a few cantonment goats
only.
In 1907, the spate of case reports suddenly subsided and at the present day it is difficult to
obtain more than very rare reports of single scattered cases of undulant fever. But this surprising
state of affairs can only be explained by one of three propositions, (1) that the earlier reports were
incorrect, (2) that in the period 1907-1939 human brucellosis in India had practically died out, or
(3) that undulant fever still occurs frequently but is either not reported or not diagnosed.
The earlier work must either be disbelieved as a whole, thus discrediting the work of several
specialists, or accepted as a whole. On the other hand, it is past belief that at the present time
frequent cases of so obvious a disease as melitensis infection could be missed in modern army hospitals.
In the face of this, an explanation must perhaps be sought in the admittedly rather improbable
proposition 2.
Now it is odd, to say the least of it, that case reports in India subsided so soon after 1907, the
very year succeeding that in which the infection rate in the British garrison at Malta was so greatly
and dramatically diminished. But nearly all the cases of genuine Malta fever reported in India,
occurred in cantonments, and in the words of Scott [1939], ' The disease was shown to be widespread
in north-west India and especially in places where British troops were stationed ' (The italics are mine
Can it be accepted then, that infection in indian cantonments was brought by trooping movements
from Malta, that dissemination was entirely localized, and, to round off the premise, that when fresh
sources of infection from Malta failed, in the absence of a sufficient animal reservoir and possibly in
the face of stricter boiling of milk, the local infection partially or wholly died out ?
During the present investigation constant attempts have been made to stimulate medical interest
in brucellosis ; but it has been rightly contended that during the wartime emergency little effort
could be spared for a disease of such apparent minor importance. The securing of human strains
has, therefore, been rendered almost impossible by the unavoidable circumstance of war.