Omaha daily bee., 1917-04-10
Serunas
Bp Frederic J. Hdskin

Washington, D. c., April s.-Among the
American industries to suffer by the recent Ger
man blockade is the serum industry. For the last
two years American biological laboratories have
| been supplying the military hospitals of Europe
with vaccines and serums, thereby waxing pros
porous. Now it is difficult to ship serum abroad,
| and Europe of necessity is manufacturing its own
| supply. Hence the commercial outlook for our
erstwhilc money making laboratories is rather
| dismal but encouraging to Uncle Sam. If we
! go to war there will be plenty OF serum on hand
with which to inoccuate volunteer army. 10
the average person this does not appear extremely
important but it is, according to the United States
public health service which has just completed
detailed inspection OF all the biological labora-
tories throughout the country to determine their
capacity in time OF war. In the first place the
army is absolutely dependent upon typhoid vac
During the Spanish-American war, before vacci-
nation was instituted sixteen men died OF typhoid
fever to every one OF bullet wounds. Smallpox
vaccination is well established. And in the pres
ent war the use Of ant-tetanus serum has reduced
the mortality rate Of tetanus from 20 to 20 per
cent
In 1885 thousands of children died in diph-
iberia epidemic which swept all the large Ameri-
can cities, the mortality rate running as high as
1859. Then Paul Erich, the great German scien-
fist, who died in 1915, discovered anti-toxin. What
Erich did was to inject diphtheria toxin into
healthy horse whose blood Immediately formed
poison to resist it. This poison, known as anti
toxin, he drew from vein in the horses neck and
injected into guinea pig which was dying with
diphtheria The guinea pig got we'll. little
girl dying with diphtheria was also given an in
lection and she got we'll So anti-toxin was dis
covered.
Today anti-toxin is made the same way. The
large biological laboratories of the country main
tain sometimes as many as 500 sleek, healthy
horses for the purpose. Fortunately the process
does not hurt the horse. Since diphtheria can be
conveyed only by living bacilli the horse does not
contract the disease, for the poison injection is
preparation from which the bacilli have been re-
moved. Neither does the bleeding process hurt
the horse any more than it hurt our suffering an
cestors who submitted to it so gracefully.
sterile tube is inserted into the jugular vein OF
the horse and gallon or more of blood drawn
off, which is placed in little glass cylinders and
packed in cold storage until the coaguation proc
ess occurs. From this preparation the serum is
then filtered small percentage of trikresol added
as preservative and it is again placed in cold
storage until tests have been made upon guinea
pigs to determine its fitness for use.
Now in addition to using ant-toxin as cura-
tive it is also used as preventive measure in the
treatment of diphtheria. The sooner the dose is
administered in the course of the disease the
greater chance the child has to recover, but where
been subjected to it, anti-toxin is given to keep
them from contracting it.
Tuberculin, a preparation given to determine
whether or not person has tuberculosis, is made
in much the same way as the diphtheria toxin IN
jected into the horse. The tuberculer bacilli are
isolated into culture and placed in an incubator,
where, as they grow, they produce poison. The
whole preparation is then put through filter,
the bacilli separated from the poison, which is
then known as tuberculn. There are several va
retes of tuberculin, but the results produced by
all are much the same. If patient has not tuber-
eulosis he will feel no iii effects-may, in fact,
feel even trihe stimulated-but if he has tuber-
culosis reaction will be evident. He will run
temperature, experience general lassitude and
show symptoms Of a rash around the surface
OF inocculation
Anti-tetanus serum is also made with the as
sistance OF the horse. The tetanus germ, however
is deadly and must be handled with greater exacti-
tude and care than any other bacillus. The poison
produced by this germ is also stronger than any
other toxin which fact may be appreciated when
it is said that hvemillionths OF gram OF tetanus
poison will kill mouse. While the serum has
been reported as very successful in curing large
proportion of tetanus cases its greatest success
is as preventive when injected into wounded
soldiers before the disease has had chance to
form.
OF different order from serums are the vac
fessions. Everyone is more or less familiar with
the vaccination mark which is his passport into
the public schools and with the fact that the
smallpox vaccine is contributed by cows. But
the mysteries of the typhoid vaccine are not so
widely known. A strong and .virile typhoid or
ganism is put in flask containing certain suit
able material and placed in an incubator to grow
At the end of short period there will be numer-
Gus bac, which are taken out and killed usu-
ally by heat, and then tested upon animals to de-
termine their satisfactory condition.
Anti-typhoid vaccination is becoming more and
more popular in this country, $4,000 people having
presented themselves for vaccination last year in
one state alone, but it is not compulsory any
where except in the army. In most countries in
Europe it is compulsory. At the beginning of
the war the British war Office had great difficulty
in enforcing vaccination among the volunteers
for a Brton hates to be compelled to do any
thing-but now there is little opposition. 1t has
proved its necessity.
1t is difficult to cover in the space Of one
short article the many varieties of vaccines and
serums on the market Some are still in the
experimental stage, such as that given for pneu-
monia; some have still to prove their success
and others, such as those used for snake-bite and
meningitis, require great deal of explanation.