The daily morning journal and courier., 1907-06-21
LOST TERRORS
 OF TIE RABIES Hydrophobia's Cure Now Certain If Treated
 Promptly.
DEATH RATE REDUCED.
Course to Follow if Bitten By a Suspected
 Dog.

doctors who deny the existence of hy- drophobia as a disease and declare that its victims die of fright merely.
 As matter of fact, hydrophobia is just as real as diphtheria or tubercu- losis and it's existence is just as easi- ly demonstrated. It is caused by some small organism, the exact nature of which is yet in doubt, and it progress es along invariable lines. When once its symptoms are fully developed it Is absolutely and utterly fatal.
 In all the literature of medicine there is no trustworthy record of a cure. But fortunately It develops slowly, and if treatment is begun within a req sonable time there is no reason why the symptoms should develop at all
 Hydrophobia is a malady of both man and beast. Dogs, wolves, cats, cattle, rabbits, monkeys and nearly all other mammals suffer from it's ray- ages. As a rule it appears in the hum- an subject as the result of a bite from some domestic animal-usually a dog.
 Following the bite there ensues an in cubation period of from two weeks to three months. During this time the victim suffers no discomfort the wound heals and all seems to be well. But all the while the minute organisms which cause death are developing in the body and one day they make them selves manifest.
 The disease once developed makes short work of it's victim. There are to o1Y Aria 4tc period of suffering is seldom more than five days. At first the patient grows melancholy and depressed.
 He complains of headache and loss of sight. He can't eat his skin itches and he sees bright lights and hears loud noises. He experiences difficulty in swallowing liquids and his voice grows husky.
 The second stage is one of great ex- citement. There are spasms of the throat and mouth and shortness of breath. Efforts to drink water are followed by painful contractions of the throat.
 This causes the patient to dread the sight of water and explains the name of the disease. Fever appears and mania develops. The patient grows violent. He froths at the mouth and makes unearthly and inarticulate ut terances. To the impressionable ob- server he seems to be barking like a dog.
 The last stage is marked by grad ual paralysis. The patients agonies cease and he sinks into unconscious ness. In from six to eighteen hours he dies
 As has been stated, it is out of the question to cure a victim of hydropho- bia after the nervous symptoms which presage the end have appeared but luckily there Is the long period of in- cubation, and during this time it is comparatively simple matter to com bat and overcome the disease
 Pasteur, after long experiments, found that the infested spinal cord of an animal killed by hydrophobla had the power of producing the disease in healthy animals, but that this power gradually disappeared. For example, if an emulsion be made of the spinal cord of rabbit which has just died of rabies and that emulsion be injected into healthy rabbit, the latter will invariably develop the malady and die.
 If however, the spinal cord of the first rabbit be kept for day or week before the emulsion is made there will appear more and more chances in favor of the second rabbits recovery. In other words, 1t is possi- ble so to attentuate and weaken viru- lent organisms, even those of hydro phobia, that they become less and less harmful and finally entirely harmless. This attenuation may be accomplish ed by various means, but in practice it has been found most satisfactory to depend upon the beneficent operation of time The spinal cords of rabbits dead of the disease are cut into small pieces and suspended in sterile glass jars over caustic potash-which ab- sorbs mosture-and kept at a uniform temperature of twentytwo degrees centigrade