Atlanta Georgian. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1912-1939, 1913-03-14
CURE
DISAPPOINTS
DR.. THRASH
Atlanta Physician Sees Serum
Test in New York and Fears
German Is "StaIIing."

IN the United States who actually have
seen the tubercle bacillus developed by
DR.. Franz Friedman, has returned to
Atlanta after attending the Friedman
clinics in New York city. He declares
that Friedmann's tests and demonstra-
lions have left him a skeptic in regard
TO the great claims made for the Berlin
doctors turtle serum.
Friedman is earnest, eXcitable and
entirely in the hands of his grasping
brother from the West" is Dr. Thrash's
summing up of the personality of the
foreign practitioner.
Leaving here early last week, DR..
Thrash arrived in New York in time
to witness Friedmann's first demon
stration of the much talked of turtle
serum to three persons selected by the
Berlin physician None of these cases
was a typical tubercular, declares Dr.
Thrash. The trio were presented to
the hospital authorities, along with
more than 100 other victims of the
dread disease
Berlin Savant Near Collapse.
The three patients were hastily mar
shalled into the clinic room, where DR..
Friedman awaited their coming. The
Berlin doctor displayed every sign of
near nervous collapse. Fumbling with
an ungraduated, old-style syringe,
Friedman drew from a cork stOppered
bottle about half a syringe full of
brown stuff, neTvously explaining in
German that the first patient was af
ficted with pulmonary tuberculosis.
Friedman tried to find a vein in the
forearm in which to inject the fluid.
The patient was fat. Tying off the ell
bow, without the use of turniquet,
Friedman failed to swell the veins OF
any extent He then abandoned the
effort to introduce the serum tntra-
venously. He then exposed the pa
TENTS leg, and finally, after losing half
the quantity of serum from the leak
ing hypodermic syringe, managed to
plunge the needle into muscle and
force the mixture under the skin.
The crude technique was repeated in
the following two subjects. At the
conclusion of the clinic, DR.. Thrash
asked Friedman concerning the first
patient.
Did you say, doctor" queried DIR,
Thrash, that the first case shown was
pulmonary tuberculosis? ?"
Friedman Becomes Angry.
Immediately Friedman heatedly eX-
planned. in German, that he certainly
did. and, walking to his brother, stand
ing at the other side Of the clinic, shout
ed excitedly, in French:
This fellow doubts my word! He
doubts my statement"
DR.. Thrash smilingly said: d..
Friedman, you misunderstood. l did
not doubt your word merely asked be-
cause I wished to be set right in the
matter"
Immediately after the clinic Fried
mann retired from the room and re-
fused to see reporters or medical men
for the remainder of the day.
An inferno at the Sinai hospital
where the clinic took place, finding an
accumulation of the serum on the floor
where It had fallen from Friedmann's
leaking syringe, hurriedly gathered
some of the stuff upon spatua and,
rushing to the hospital laboratory, made
stains of the mysterious fluid. These
we're viewed through a standard micro
scope. 1t was the first time since
friedman announced his cure" that
any one besides Friedman himself ac-
tually had seen what his serum looked
like under the chemists glass.
Germ Count Impossible.
DIR. Thrash declares the Friedman
bacillus appears to be as short as the
bovine tuberculosis bacillus and as thin
as the human tuberculosis bacillus,
but more pointed than the human germ.
The mixture from which DIR. friedman
drew his injections was isolated ba-
cillus mixed in common salt solution.
1t appeared to DIR. Thrash that Fried
mann had hurriedly placed some of his
germs in a common bottle, poured in
the salt solution and then prepared for
his clinic.
The modern way to prepare serum
is to drop sterilized balls or shot into
such a mixture and before injection be
certain that the composition has thor
puSnlN ABSORBED the germs uC "'N
ties of serum exhibited by Friedman
were literally cIogged with masses oil
bacillus, declared DR., Thrash, thus
preventing any actual count Of the
germs as required by even decent
standards of modern medicine.
Il noted that Friedman took no
pains to graduate his dosage either at
the Sinai clinic or the one next day
when he was in charge of his friends
Friedman merely looked at the pa
tients as they appeared, dipped his old
styled instrument into the brown mix
ture and injected it without differen-
tiating between severe and mild cases
Dodged Pulmonary Gases.
Friedman fought shy of pulmonary
cases. frankly expressing the wish to
treat only bone cases Bone tubercu-
losis, might add, is the easiest form OF
tuberculosis to treat. 1t yields much
more easily to all forms of medication"
DR. Thrash declared that friedman
seemed to be "stalling" throughout his
entire two days demonstration.