Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1937-11-18

Medical science may have conquered
the most terrible-at least picturesquely
terrible-disease which ever has afflicted
mankind
This is the bubonic plague, or black
fever Reports to the United States
Public Health Service from the French
colony of Madagascar state that an
effective protective vaccine has been pre-
pared and tested by the Pasteur Lnsti-
tute's experiment station on that island
During three years an active vaccination
campaign has been in progress, with the
result that the number of cases has been
reduced more than fifty per cent. 1t is
reported that the number stricken with
the disease has been from five to ten
times greater among unvaccinated per-
sons than among those who were
vaccinated
To the modern American or European
bubonic plague, spread by rat fleas, is
something vague and far away. Yet this
is the same disease that almost depopu-
lated Northwestern Europe during the
18th century. 1t was probably the NAL
ady responsible for the great plague of
London in the 18th century.
Since then the fever has made only an
occasional appearance in the Western
World. 1t has come to be looked upon as
one OF the menaceS which have been
wiped off the books. The means of its
spread are known. 1t is, it is assumed
only necessary to raise effective barriers
against flea-lnfested rats coming from
regions where the malady still exists.
This is only partly true. The supposed
banishing of bubonic plague hardly can
be set down as one of the triumphs of
medical science. After a few terrible
epidemics in Europe-Where it may have
been brought by the returning Crusad-
ers-it seemed to die out of its own
accord and has not seen fit to return.
Perhaps all those in the population highly
susceptible to it died, leaving only rela-
lively resistant people behind A more
favored theory is that the plague virus
itself became so attenuated that it lost
its virulence. Even in countries like Mad
agascar it hardly occurs in what might
be called epidemics.
Yet the fact remains that a case is
reported now and then in the United
States. Ground squirrels and other wild
rodents in the Pacific Coast States are
known to carry the virus and there is
constant campaign of eradication against
them. Fortunately, a human being is
very unlikely to come in contact with the
feas which infest these wild animals
There is, however, one point Of contact
the city dump. There wild rodents and
the house rat are likely to come into
close proximity. The rats may carry the
virus-bearing feas into the homes. The
ground squirrels are a potential reservoir.
The great danger is of a recurrence of
the epidemic form of the disease. What
it did once it might, under favorable cir
cumstances which no man could predict,
do again. 1t has had long time to
rebuild its lost virulence. Whatever
human resistance may have been acquired
probably is long since lost.
Consequently, the news that human
beings can be protected against the dis
ease by vaccination is potentially of con-
siderable Importance all over the world.
X X 4
1t is barely century since elk and
bison became extinct in the Alleghanies.
Both were abundant in George Wash
ington's day, according to DR.. Remington
Kellogg, Smithsonian Institution man.
malogist, whose report on the present.
day mammals Of West Virginia has Just