Some aspects of infantile syphilis : being the Hunterian lectures delivered at the Royal College of Surgeons in 1896 / by J.A. Coutts.

  • Coutts, J. A., 1909-
Date:
1897
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Some aspects of infantile syphilis : being the Hunterian lectures delivered at the Royal College of Surgeons in 1896 / by J.A. Coutts. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University Libraries/Information Services, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University.

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    each successive infant in a family as more syphilitic than the last—a dreadful state of things to contemplate if true. But fortunately, I think, all experience proves its falsity and that of the theory that gave it birth. It is repulsive enough that a woman should be compelled to bear syphi- litic infants against her will. This repul- siveness would be vastly increased if syphilis by conception were proven, and that such a woman could be tainted from her unborn infant. The one slight tittle of evidence in favour of the possibility of syphilis by conception is that afforded by Ricord and Diday, and Henoch quotes Fournier and Mr. Hutchinson to the same effect, that they have known women to have lived long with syphilitic partners and escaped contamination as long as they remained sterile, but conception brought syphilis in its train. But cases such as these, where proof of infection by the ordinary methods is wanting, are not sufficient in number to free them from the class dependent on mere coincidence. I have stated my disbelief in the theory