The Bamberg herald. [volume] (Bamberg, S.C.) 1891-1972, 1914-11-12
REFITES FRIEEMANN'S CLAIMS.
Public Health Service Reports on
''Tuberculosis Cure"

w aSnlQSlOn. NOV. 81 He Suie
for tuberculosis, which aroused such
a sensation in this country when
Dr.. F. F. Friedman, the Berlin ply
sician, came here in the spring OF
1918, has just been made the sub
ject of a report by the United States
public health service.
This remedy was so widely herald
ed by sensational newspaper notice
that it seems safe to say that there
could hardly be a person OF adult
years in the country who did not hear
something about it. or victim or
tuberculosis who did not experience
a thrill Of hope of speedy and COM
plete sure. The report naturally does
not deal with the pitiful and sordld
details of the scenes ensuing upon
DR.. Friedmann's advent, of the
crowds of invalids, many of them
penniless, battling for a chance to
take the treatment, Of the greedy ex-
ploitation of hopeless cases who hap
pened to have money, and the turn
ing away of those who did not. The
report details merely the medical OBJ
servations made on certain patients,
the laboratory studies on the culture
used by DR.. Fdiedmann, and refers
to the moral peculiarities of the doc
tor, only sufficiently to make it clear
that it was his own fault that the in
vestigation was not continued long
er and upon a greater number OF
suitable cases.
1t is pointed out that the manner
in which DR.. Friedman presented his
claims before the Berlin Medical So
ciety made them paramount to a con-
tention that he had discovered at
last the sovereign cure for tubercu-
losis in all it's forms, provided, OF
course, that the disease had not al
ready progressed beyond all hope OF
recovery. These claims the report
takes up in detail and then draws
the deadly parallel between them and
the results of the application of the
treatment to patients under the OBJ
servation of the service doctors.
Whereas the claims are based on
cases which always seem to get well,
or at least to show phenomenal i'm
provement, after one or two lnJec-
tions, the cases which reacted in this
manner among the test series were
conspicuously few. The report does
not commit itself as to whether the
improvement noted in these few cases
was due to the treatment or to the
stimulus of great hope, or to unas-
signable causes which work improve
ment in some cases of every large
series; but it does point out distinct
ly that if any one prefers the first
explanation he must in justice at
tribute also to the treatment the very
distinct and unusual deterioration In
in the condition of certain other pa
tients which progressed in some OF
them to a speedy death. Aside from
these more serious cases it was
shown that about one-fourth Of all
the cases receiving the treatment de-
veloped running sores or Assesses
at the place where they were inject
ed, happening which DR.. Fried
mann had admitted to be unfavora-
BILE to a cure, but which he claimed
to have completely overcome by his
method Of injecting the material in
to the veins.
A long series of experiments with
the bacteria used by Friedman is
reported, which show that the germ
is different from the varieties of tu-
bercu!ar bacilli commonly known at
the present time, and that far from
making small animals more resist
ant to tubercular infection, it made
the majority of those inoculated more
susceptible. The report is, therefore,
in line with other reports coming
from scientific sources here and
abroad, which have refuted DR..
Friedmann's claims to the discovery
of specific cure for tuberculosis.
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