Evening star., 1934-06-14
TYPHOID MEDICINE
WINS GOLD MEDAL
Newly Announced Serum Is
Product of Intricate
Detective Work.
BY the Associated Press.

CLEVELAND, June 14-The gold
medal of the American Medical Asso-
citation today goes to a new medicine
for typhoid fever, just announced
here.
Even more important than the
medicine, in the opinion OF the
Awarding Committee, is the method
which produced it. For this process
holds promise of finding new remedies
for others of mans most troublesome
infectious diseases.
The award was made in the scien-
tific exhibit to Gregory Schwartzman,
M. D., of Mount Sinai Hospital, New
York City. He originated the process
which produced the anti-toxin serum.
This process unravels some of the
complication" which are the despair
of the physician It follows a medical
trail as surprising as any thriller"
plot.
Rabbit Plays Its Part.
A bacterial filtrate, the liquid from
which all bacteria have been ex-
tracted, is injected into the skin of a
rabbit This f1ltrate is poisonous, but
after "a hours nothing serious hap
pens to the rabbits skin.
Then after another "a hours, the
same filtrate is injected into the rab-
bits blood. Nothing happens to the
blood. But on the spot where the
same fltrate was injected so harm
lesSly into the rabbits skin there ap-
pears savage sore.
Then the scientific detective has to
skip to large animal for the next
step in unraveling the action of this
filtrate poison. A horse usually is
chosen. The same original filtrate is
injected into the horse until a serum
develops in his blood. If this serum
is then injected into the rabbit the
sores no longer can be produced.
Tested on 100 Humans.
BY following this cycle, the medical
scientist can develop serum of sufi-
cient potency to offset the poison OF
the filtrate, yet not too strong to risk
killing the patient.
This was the method followed to
obtain the new typhoid medicine. 1t
has been tested on about 100 human
beings, at Mount Sinai Hospital, the
United States Marine Hospital in New
Orleans and the Charity Hospital in
New Orleans
Collaborating in these tests were
DR.. George Baehr, DR.. William Y.
Hollingsworth and DR.. Mccoy, direc--
tor of the National Health Institute
in Washington.
The typhoid remedy, in about 10
per cent of the cases, shortened the
course of the disease and helped to
free patients from general toxic
effects.
Opium Derivatives for Colds.
Experiments with 2,508 common
colds which show two derivatives of
opium as the best remedies, about
twice as effective as anything else
tried, were reported by Harold S.
Diehl, M. D., of Minneapolis. He
gave these same findings to the med
ical world last December, when they
attracted wide attention. Today's re-
port repeated the findings with new
feature, that the opium had continued
to work in the same favorable way on
a larger number of common cold vic
tins.
Against opium, DR.. Diehl tried II
well known common cold remedies.
The dozen produced improvement in
from 80 to 48 per cent of the sufferers,
while the opium derivitives were effec-
tive about 10 per cent.
But plain sugar tablets improved
IS per cent of the common-cold vic
time, and as sugar has no effect on
colds, DR.. Diehl said this showed that
about 35 per cent of the patients
would have improved without any cold
remedy at all.
Cats Cause Eczema.
A new skin trouble due to oil in
the common ragweed was reported by
Louis A. Brunsting. M. D., and c.
Russell Anderson, M. D., of Rochester,
MINI.
Eggs and cat hair are common
causes of eczema in young children,
said Lewis Webb Hill, M. D., of
Boston. Taking eggs out Of the diet
and cats out of the house cures such
cases, he said. Cleveland J. White,
M D.. of Chicago. told of foods which
sometimes cause skin troubles. Elimi-
mating one food at time usually un-
covers the cause.