The Spanish Fork press. [volume] (Spanish Fork, Utah) 1902-current, 1895-08-09

That cats are capable of contracting
and propagating diphtheria has been
known for a long time; in fact, news
paper items warning children not to
indulge in familiafities with ailing pets
are not infrequent. The Importance of
the subject has recently been empha-
sized, however, by small epidemic at
Brighton, England, which seems to
have been traced pretty directly to
these animals. We quote an account
from the British Medical journal (Lon-
don, June 29th):
1.-The cat is acquiring a bad reputation
In Brighton. DIR. Newsholme, in his re-
Gently Issued quarterly report devotes
separate section to a description of an
outbreak of suspicious Illness among cats
in q particular district of the town, and
10 a warning against keeping cats which
are suffering from certain enumerated
symptoms. DR.. Newsholmes attention
was called to cats by the fact that In the
neighborhood between Elm Grove and
Southover street, part of Brighton in
habited almost solely by the laboring
classes, there had been notified a group
of cases of dlphtheria in the course OF
single fortnight, which pointed distinctly
to the operation of some local cause. The
patients comprised both children and
adults. They did not attend any particu.
lar school; there was no community OF
milk supply; personal infection from case
to case could not be traced; and no sani-
tary defects were found in the affected
houses. But in each instance there was
a history that the household cat mad been
i'll, and in several families the child who
was specially fond of the cat was the
sole victim of diphtheria. The illness OF
the affected cats had not been carefully
observed, but 1t included one or more of
the following symptoms A bad cough,
difficulty in swallowing, discharge from
the nose, and marked emaclatlon. In
some of the houses the cat had simply
been observed to be wasting, and in sew
eral instances the head or the household
volunteered the surmise that the cat had
been poisoned In one house In the CEN
ter of the affected neighborhood, nlne
live cats were found, and the nelghbors
stated that in the previous week dead
cat lay IN the yard attached to TINS
house. with discharge oozing from its
nostrils. In another house a mild case
of dlphtheria was attributed to the smell
arising from a cat which had died in a
garden adjoining the house -Four of the
emaciated cats referred to above were Sc
cured. and necropsy, including a bacteri-
illogical examination was made, but with
entirely negative results. The illness OF
the cats in question dated from at least
month before the opportunity Tor eN-
amining them arose, so that the negative
result is not surprising. 1t will be re-
membered that DR.. Klein, in his investi-
cation into cat diphtheria, fouad that the
diphtheria Infection produced in the cat
an acute lung Inflammation, the kidneys
becoming degenerated in the manner
known in man as the large white kid
new The condition of the household cat
Is worth inquiring into in all such local
outbreaks as the one briefly described by
DIR. Newsholme: and 1t may be well to
remember that If the cat can be secured
for anatomical examination, even in the
acute stage of the disease, there will
probably be no eXudation in the throat,
but only marked pneumonia and possibly
also renal Inflammation The public
warning given in Brighton as to cats has
had the desired effect, the sman outbreak
having come to an abrupt termination
with the destruction of suspected cats,
and of MANY others whose career has
been shortened in consequence of the
publicity given to the facts of the case" "