The daily morning journal and courier., 1902-05-23
APPENDICITIS AND MEAT.


 | These days of the beef trust make
 any facts that may tend to win us
 away from our devotion to flesh food welcome; now is the chance of the veg etarian to get in his work with us and gain many new converts. It is a hardly disputable fact that the most of us eat altogether too much meat and if the trust controls of the meat industry forces upon us tempering ot our overindulgence it will be some- thing to be thankful for and must re- suit in healthier nation. As to whether or not the entire abandon ment of meat as an article of diet is
 advisable or possible, that is mooted
 question; like many other fetiches,
 it is an excellent end to work toward. New and important light on the sub
 ject is afforded by recent statements or
 Dr. Lucas Champoniere, the celebrated
 French surgeon, who attributes to the
 to free use of flesh foods the prevalence
 of appendicitis. Good Health gives a
 comprehensive summary of the views
 of Dr. Champoniere, who ascertained
 and demonstrated the facts in conse-
 quence of his appointment by the Pa
 IlSldH dCuGIly Ol IHtIlNlllC Ip lliNt1-
 tigate the cause of appendicitis. His
 report will no doubt be something of
 shock to those who believe that flesh
 of animals affords the most digestible,
 strengthening and wholesome form of nutriinent, The old idea that append
 icitis is due to foreign bodies lodging in the little pocket attached to the lower end of the caecum. has long been known to be quite untenable. The ap- pendix keeps its door tightly closed until it becomes inhamed and enfeebed by disease, then it's valve-like oritice becomes relaxed and foreign sub- drop in. The cause of this in- fammat ton and relaxation is, in the great majority of cases, unquestionably catarrh or chronic Inflammation of the mucous membrane. The disease does not begin in the appendix. but in the intestine, finding its way into the ap- pendix later.
 Catarrhal disease of the stomach and intestines is due to germs which. be- come colonized upon the mucous mem brane, and multiply prodigiously when stimulated by favorable nutriment, finding their way into the millions of little glandular pockets scattered over the intestine, thus establishing a chronic malady. which assumes the va rious forms of chronic gastritis en- teritis, infectious jaundice colitis and appendicitis. Laboratory experiments have shown that the most favorable | for the cultivation of these | germs is meat and meat juices. They | will not grow in fruit juice, and they | develop very feebly and slowly in so- utions of cereals; but their develop | nent is extremely rapid and they &C., 1uire the highest degree of viruence or deadly activity in beef tea. beef ex- | racts, boulllon and animal broths of | III sorts, If flesh fod is eaten freely | here is always present in the alimen- | ary canl not only extracts of beef | m which these producing terms thrive luxuriously, but frag- nents of half-starved flesh undergoing changes, The poison pro- luced by the germs to which these of decay are due damage he mucous membrane, lowering the ,itality of the patient, and thus pre- ,aring the way for the action of the ,athogenic or diseased condition of microbes which gives rise to intestinal atarrh and the other forms of inf1am- nation.-Springfield Homestead.