The sea coast echo. [volume] (Bay Saint Louis, Miss.) 1892-current, 1917-06-30

the living anthrax bacillus, even
though greatly attenuatsd, have
turned their attention to the produc-
ton of a serum that should possess
immunizing powers equal to those of
the attenuated organism. The immu-
nifty granted by serum inoculations
become effective very quickly, but
does not last long unless reinforced
| by the addition of virulent material
| at about the time that the serum is
injected. At first the virulent mater
ial was injected a few days after the
serum had been applied, but the latest
recommendations are that they should
ha, given simultaneously; wherefore
lit is now customary to inject immu-
| nizing serum into one side of the an
imal's neck and virulsnt serum into
the other side before releasing it.
Very interesting facts have been
| disclosed through the efforts of vari-
Gus Investigators to perfect sera for
| .mmunizing outbreaks of anthrax. 1t
| is we'll known that a very small
| amount of virulent blood Will serve
TO convey ti2e disease from an anthrax
| carce.=s to a healthy animal. A fly
can easily carry enough on his pro
| boscis to kill a horse. 1t may safely
| be admitted that a single drop is suf-
| ficient to cause the death of a horse;
yet sobernheim has, by means of 1e-
peated injections, using cultures grad
| ually increasing IN Wirulence, pro
duced such high degree of immunity
in a horse that it withstood the injec-
! ton into it's veins of 500 C. C. (about
{ MI n
of the most virulent anthrax culture
| obtainable. This is good Illustration
/ of the word Immunity" 1t is some
| thing that this horse in question has
| received into his system through The
| several inoculations of sera that en-
ables him to receive unharmed an in
| lection of living anthrax fully ten
| thousand times as large as the
| amount that would have sufficed to
kill him previous to his immunlzatlon.
| Another peculiarity discovered by
| invss 5igators along these lines is that
a culture of anthrax bacilh that has
| once been attenuated can then be cul
| :ivated indefinitely without necessarl-
w causing any alteration in the
| degree of it's virulence If we let 100
repres ant the vixulence of an active,
fresh culture, and 10 the degrees OF
v.rulence in one that has been greatly
| attenuated, it has bben repeatedly
shown that one can cultivate the at
teauated germs for many generations
without causing any observable al.
teration from this virulence rating OF
10; yet it only requires the single
massage of this material through a
white mouse to restore its virulence
| at once to approximately 100.
In this country the Delta lands Of
the Mississippi Valley are most thor
oughly parmeated with an nshrax IN
fection. The losses through anthrax
have there been enormous, due IN
| great measure to the large numoar
Of valuable mules owned and worked
upon the sugar plantations. DR.. w.
H. Dalrymple has or years been
engaged in fighting this plague in
Louisiana, and he reports as follows
en- the results of preventive lnocula-
| ton:
Perhaps the most convincing evl-
dence of the beneficial effect Of this
| method Of prevention in louisiana is
the fact that those localities which
suffered most from yearly, or at least
periodic, epizootics of anthrax, before
vaccination became SO generally ad-
apted. have experienced the past sum-
mer wonderful degree of immunity
from the disease which, | think, we
must attribute to the fact that the
use of the lymph is now almost gen
eral in these sections and that greater
attention is being directed to the more
careful disposal of the dead animal,
our people more fully appreciate its
being the chief source from which
this most deadly disease is spread.
| believe we are gradually solving
| the anthrax problem in the Pelican
State, and the progress we have al
ready made is, I think, considerable
and fairly satisfactory when we take
into account the erroneous and Wis
ionary IDEAS which prevailed up to
ten or twelve years ago regarding the
true nature of the disease and the
most potent factors in causing its