The commonwealth. (Greenwood, Miss.) 1896-1923, 1906-06-01
DISEASE IN MUMM|ES
ANCIENT wRAPpINGs CONTAIN
TUBERCULAR BACILLI.
White Plague Said to Have Been Car
ried to Europe from Egypt with
First Corpses Trans
ported.
Versus

Chicago. - "Egyptology Versus
Health was the title of a monograph
received at the tuberculosis institute
of Chicago in a recent afternoon, in
which it was alleged that the great
spread of tuberculosis in Europe and
America in the last 100 years found
its causation in the disinterment and
shipment broadcast over the land of
the mummies which had reposed so
long in the tombs of the Pharaohs.
The monograph was written by DR..
Rafaelle Sorgnac, one of the lecturers
at the Sorbonne in Paris, who was
an interested visitor at the recent tn.
b~erculosis exhibit in the city.
THAT the disinterred mummies
started the spread of the tuberculosis
germs in Egypt cannot be doubted"
says DR.. Sorgnac in his monograph.
"Champollion did much for the world
when he discovered the key TO the
hieroglyphs, but loosened death on the
world when he caused the mummies to
be disentombed. There are more tn.
berculosis germs in the almost i'm
palpable dust around a mummy case
than in many %cuspidors of efiuvia.
These germs live for thousands Of
years, as has easily been proven, and
the elimination of the bodies, even
the well-preserved ones, caused an cpl
demic of consumption among the
workmen and scholars who first ex-
humed the cases. 1t is also well
known that the keepers of the mummy
cases have been subject to the disease.
'"The start of tuberculosis in France
in a serious sense may be traced to
the great importation of mummies
and mummy cases at the time OF the
Napoleonic invasion of Egypt and this
start gave the disease its first great
foothold in Europe, whence 1t has
spread all over the western world.
Dead bodies may not secrete the
germs, but dead bodies are undoubt-
eddy a favorite lodging place for the
tuberCular bacilli.
THE bacilli from the mummies are
undoubtedly of great age and it has
been shown by experiments in Paris
that these aged bacilli are infinitely
more deadly than those obtained from
the sputum of live persons who are
infected. There may or may not be a
poetic justice in the secretion of bacilli
in mummy cases which attack those
who have desecrated the tombs of the
J,pj hYt tbn annparanpp nf Thl
bacilli cannot be made a subject for
discussion. 1t is a solid fact. Num-
my cases and mummies are a mora
deadly source of the disease called
consumption than any other two fac
tors combined.
THE first mummies brought the
white plague to Europe and every
Egyptian corpse which Is unearthed
is a pesthouse of deadly germs even
after it has been subjected to a sea
voyage and to fumigation. 1t is al
most impossible to kill the bacilli
which are found in the mummy wrap
pings and the cases are nearly always
full of a dust which abounds in germs
which have been lying dormant for
ages"
Local physicians we're inclined to
deride DR.. Sorgnac's theory that the
white plague of modern times started
with the importation Of mummies, but
none would gainsay the fact that the
favorite haunt of the bacillus was the
proximity of the dead, no matter how
the bodies had been preserved.