The Salt Lake herald-Republican. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1909-1918, 1910-10-02

and the United States il is still almost
a medical curiosity. and the bulk of it
is made at the new antitOXin institute
created by the British government in
Asia.
The nine antitOXins mentioned above
are all true antitoxins in the sense
that they introduce into the blood
certain qualities that either kill the
pOisOns that have attacked the body
or else so affect the blood that il is
enabled by its own increased vital
qualities TO stand OFF the disease from
a successful attack and the following
mortality. Such is the object of all
antitoxins, but the process proceeds
In two widely different methods.
The perfect antitoxin can be put
into the human body long after the
disease has begun, and still kill the
thriving poison germs. Such a one is
the antitOXin against diphtheria. The
second class must be called the pre-
VentiVe antitOXins such as that for
typhoid. smallpox and the plague.
These must be put into the blood be-
fore the disease is caught" to use a
popular phrase If this is done, i'm
munity 10 the particular malady is
obtained The immunity is not for
ever. and indeed. varies according to
of all to the amount the individual
is exposed TO cOnJagion.
For example. with the plague, only
the ordinary person would be inOcu-
lated when he was known TO have
lived near a case or 10 have been
near a sick person. On the other
hand, nurses. physicians and hospital
work in the midst of an outbreak of
bubonic plague must receive an injec-
ton of from five TO ten centimeters of
the antitoxin every twenty days.
Treating AntitOxin Horses.
The animals whose blood furnishes
the basis of all the antitoxin produced
at the Pasteur institute are magnifi-
cent creatures as can be seen from
the specimen shown. Many of these in
use today have been bred from ami
mails themselves treated for antitOXins,
and the blood of such horses shows a
marvellous inherited ability to Kill off
the special diseases treated by the
antitOXins.
The Pasteur stables at Villeneuve-
L'Etang, then, are the crude sources
of antitOxin supply for the big labOra-
tories in the institute at Paris. When
it is realized that the animals must
be physically superb and that in ad-
]
and a half and sometimes longer TO
get an animal ready to furnish anti
plague serum, there is little difficulty
in imagining the financial value at
tached TO the best specimens
Their attendants are Uniformed and
wear numbered caps with a military
visor. The sanitary conditions are
naturally perfect-the cleanliness of
the stables being as near absolute as
up-tO-d8te science can make them.
All dirt is removed as accumulated
and vacuum cleaning is done through
out once each week.
The animals belong to two classes
and are carefully kept separated. The
first class is of animals already treat
ed-such as. for instance, bubonic
plague or tetanus. These horses are
those which furnish the material for
the antitoxin laboratories in the Paris
institute. Once having achieved per-
feet or nearly perfect immunization,
the horses need to be reinoculated
only between blOOd-lettings.
As 10 the blood lettings. there is
nothing cruel in them. In fact. these
fine animals. fed with the highest
priced and most nourishing food, ac
tually require blood-letting TO keep
them in condition, since their being
devoted TO the use of science prevents
them from doing the hard work de-
manded OF their kind in the world at
large.
Making an AntitOxin Horse
There is something almost unnat-
ural in this creation of an ordinary.
healthy, fine-bred horse into an ami
NAL whose life blood contains healing
for the nations when plaques fall
upon them and would kill men, wom-
en- and children by the thousands. The
process for all the antitoxins in much
the same, differing only in details.
That used TO create a horse with
blood containing a cure for diphtheria
is as follows: The medical man in
charge of this particular horse takes
a small quantity of the diphtheria
germs in liquid culture and careful
" filters in and reduces its strength
much below normal. This weakened
dose is 10 try on the horse in order to
find out just how susceptible il is to
diphtheria.
With young and healthy horses II Is
remarkable what a tremendous differ
ence is found to exist in their ability
10 resist the disease poison injected
into them. Some animals fall i'll from
only a quarter of a cubic centimeter;
others require as much as twenty
centimeters. and. in rare cases. it has
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