8
NOTES AND STATISTICS ON VACCINATION IN BURMA
and to recover the cost for culpable wastage from those responsible.
Such reports have been received from 18 places. The Director of
the Vaccine Depôt states that some difficulty is experienced in selling
calves after vaccination. Only female calves are used in the Depôt,
and on an average 25 to 30, of ages between 9 and 18 months, are
available for sale each month. The Veterinary Adviser to the
Government of Burma has been addressed on this point in the hope
that he may be able to suggest a market for these calves.
During the year certain experiments were carried out at the
Depôt. Sub-Assistant Surgeon, Maung Kyaw Din, inoculated a calf
and a rabbit with a mixture which was being used by Burmese Sayas
of Minbu District and which was reported to produce vesicles and to
protect against small-pox. The constituents of the mixture were
mare's milk, pink resin and python's gall, and needless to say the
inoculation resulted in failure. The same animals were later vacci-
nated successfully with stock lymph. Possibly the Sayas added
small-pox crust to their mixture and produced true small-pox !
Two calves of the same size and colour (bearing Nos. 338 and
339) were inoculated with lymph No. 326. On the fourth day after
inoculation calf No. 339 had the better vesicles while those of the
other calf were poor. An abdominal binder, soaked in distilled
water was applied three hourly to calf No 338 the one with poorer
vesicles. On the fifth day the calves were scraped and No. 338
produced twice as much lymph as the other. Though it is too early
to judge of the quality of the lymph produced, it would seem that the
application of moisture increases the quantity when the weather is
hot. Instructions are being issued to test this point very carefully.
Rangoon Corporation Vaccine Depôt was closed from 1st April
1923, and lymph was obtained from Meiktila throughout the year
under report, the total lymph provided to Rangoon amounting to
29,224 tubes.
14. Training Class.—Forty-four apprentice vaccinators as against
78 last year were trained. All passed except four, who were allowed
one month's further training by the Director of Public Health, and
they also passed at the expiration of the period. Twenty-two Public
Health Irspectors began their course of vaccination instruction on
24th March 1924.
Statt.
II.
15. Cost of Vaccination Department.—The total expenditure
during the year was Rs. 343,262-0-10 as against Rs. 3,24,782-7-11
for 1922-23. The increase is due to the fact that the Inspectors
of Vaccination in some districts of Upper Burma have been allowed
to draw arrears of pay and bonus with retrospective effect from 1st
March 1923. Though there is an excess of Rs. 18,479-8-11 in the
total expenditure, the average cost of each successful vaccination was
only Re. 0-9-3 as against Re. 0-9-2 for the preceding year.
Low rates for each successful case of vaccination were reported
from Minbu (Re. 0-4-8), Myingyan and Magwe (each Re. 0-5-3),
Akyab (Re. 0-5-4), Sagaing (Re. 0-5-5), Tharrawaddy (Re. 0-6-4),
Ma-ubin (Re. 0-6-7), Lower Chindwin (Re. 0-6-8), and Henzada and
Pyapôn (each Re. 0-6-10). High rates were incurred at Pakôkku Hill
Tracts (Rs. 1-10-8), Mergui (Rs. 1-5-10), Hill Districts of Arakan
(Rs. 1-5-0), Myitkyina (Rs. 1-4-2) and Katha (Rs. 1-0-1)) for eaeh