The evening times., 1899-04-17
Origin of Spinal Meningitis.

10 tnc tultor OF Inc lines:
l have received copy OF any report from the
Health Office, must claim recognition for a
reply, through your columns, to the article you
published. l regret bavc received no official
copy of this able defence Of vaccination, for your
contemporary. the Star says in lis copy of
the alleged report that the case had not been
due to vaccination whereas your paper says il
had been" Also the Star says: 1.-Two are
reported not to have been vaccinated recently"
whereas in your rcpor, the mot is omitted. !
at loss to know which is correct. for
would hail with delight the who dared TO
speak the truth in the face of his confreres.
! appealed for a '.dsinterested'' Investigation
and not one where twenty or twenty-one biased
physicians could. from their individual impress
sions. render verdict. We all know how. these
reports tabulated, and any off-hand remark
recorded as fact especially when Of material
interest to ones self. Many such experiences could
be chroncled from the operating table. even il
sworn testimony needed after death.
Evidence of vaccination could not be obtained
after burial, for many a man was yaccinated un
known to his friends or relatives. and the Health
Department well know. should know, that
septicaemia. or pyaemia tevery phase OF cerebro-
spinal meningitis is acknowledged by the pro-
fession to depend, in the first place,
altered or poisoned condition of the bood) may
be caused by mere scratch, and the surface
wound healed, and still cause death from blood
poisoning.
There is slurrirg the facts with
the statement that the relation between ce-e-
bro-spinal meningitis, etc. etc. and vaccination,
is too cratic to be followed. and therefore not
susceptible Of intelligent consideration and that
medical literature fails to demonstrate the
istence of any relation between vaccination and
cerebro-spinal meningitis
The press published several interviews from
doctors who acknowledged they knew nothing OF
the disease, and blamed drinking water, biz
yards, etc, ETC., when more potent cause was
evident, but, unfortunately, pointing to the med
ical practitioner (who vaccinates) the cause
of it. l have made slight study of this and
endemoepidemic diseases. and based my sugges
tions to the department upon the result Of per-
sOnal observations in many Several years
ago i investigated two eases Zone fata), and
as two COWS had died Of cerebro-spinal menin-
gifts in the same parish. l led to trace
the origin to the milk supply; but contagion
could not. in these cases, be traced to that
source. l heard from the survivor last year that
he with his friend, who died, had gone to
neighboring town ten days prior to the attack
and had been vaccinated
II an impartial investigation had been made
free from medical supervision, and had enquiresl
into the facts, vaccination would have received
its deathblow, but presume the medical faculty
will make hard fight for it. as was done un-
successfully by some physicians in Europe.
have seen too many cases of cancer or con-
sumption (and lately cerebro-spinal meningtis)
directly due to vaccination; l also give some
credit to the advance medical science has made
in the past thirty years Denncr, the originator
OF vaccination, died nearly 100 years ago) in
chemistry, bacteriology, and the pathology OF
the disease of animals transmissible TO man, to
endorse for one moment the practice uf inoculat.
ing the human being from the lower animal.
JOS. A. THOMPSON.
Alexandria, Va, April TO-