Immunity, Protective Inoculations in Infectious Diseases and Serum-Therapy (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1895. Excerpt: ... n. CHICKEN CHOLERA. Pasteur's researches with reference to the etiology of the disease known in France as cholera des poules, first led him to the discovery that a virulent culture of a pathogenic bacterium may become "attenuated" by certain agencies, and that immunity may be conferred upon susceptible animals by inoculating them with such attenuated culture. We now know that his microbe of fowl cholera is a widely distributed bacillus, which is frequently encountered in putrefying material, and that it is also extremely fatal to pigeons, pheasants, sparrows, rabbits, and mice. Also that the same, or nearly allied species, may produce an infectious disease of swine (Schweineseuche), of cattle (HinderseucJie), and of deer (Wildseuche). Subcutaneous injection of a minute quantity of a virulent culture usually kills chickens within forty-eight hours. Some time before death the fowl falls into a somnolent condition, and, with drooping wings and ruffled feathers, remains standing in one place until it dies. Infection may also occur from the ingestion of food moistened with a culture of the bacillus, or soiled with the discharges from the bowels of other infected fowls. At the autopsy the mucous membrane of the small intestine is found to be inflamed and studded with small hemorrhagic foci, as are also the serous membranes; the spleen is notably enlarged. The bacilli are found in great numbers in the blood, in the various organs, and in the contents of the intestine. In rabbits death commonly occurs in from sixteen to twenty hours, and is often preceded by convulsions. The temperature is elevated at first, but shortly before death it is reduced below the normal. The post-mortem appearances are: Swelling of the spleen and lymphatic glands; ecchymoses or diffuse ...