The anti-zymotic or anti-fermentive treatment of Asiatic cholera / by J. Scoffern.

  • Scoffern, J. (John), 1814-1882.
Date:
1866
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The anti-zymotic or anti-fermentive treatment of Asiatic cholera / by J. Scoffern. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    in a sugar refinery at Cork. The cholera was making great ravages there. Not one of our men was affected with the disease: not one had diarrhoea even. The only known or recog- nisable condition of life in which they were placed otherwise than their neighbours, was the atmosphere of sulphurous acid in which they were bathed, and had to breathe. Was their immimity fairly referable to the presence of this anti-putrescent disinfectant ? Their case does not, of course, furnish any crucial proof; there are no crucial proofs in pathology. The issue, nevertheless, cannot be accepted in any other sense than as favourable to the general assumption of the anti-choleraic power of sulphurous acid. Furthermore, in the year 1849, whilst cholera was so rife in London, a model room was fitted up at Shears’s, the Copper- smiths, of Bankside, Southwark, one of the most affected localities. The model room was for the conducting of my sulphurous acid process of sugar refinery on a small scale. A stafi* of workmen was appointed to manage this process. Not one of them suffered from cholera, or even diarrhoea with any severity. Nevertheless, others of the establishment were stricken and died; in fact, Bankside, during 1849, was a veritable cholera nesf. These facts strongly impressed me at the time, but, being then much engaged in chemical pursuits, and wholly absolved from medical practice, I did not give them publicity, or carry them out to any practical development. At the time to which reference is made, viz., the year 1849, the zjTnotic or fermentive theory of cholera had barely taken hold of the minds of pathologists; otherwise, probably the suggestion of administering sulphite of lime might have found immediate application. In the years 1849 and 1850, I had occasion to be much in