Anthrax as an occupational disease : revision of Bulletin 205 / by John B. Andrews.

  • Andrews, John B. (John Bertram), 1880-1943.
Date:
1920
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Licence: In copyright

Credit: Anthrax as an occupational disease : revision of Bulletin 205 / by John B. Andrews. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    skin handlers and other tannery employees, longshoremen, wool- sorters, hair workers, brush makers, paper makers, farmers, ranch- men, liverymen, and veterinarians. Among nonfatal cases reported in several States and by a number of hospitals the same groups of occupations are strongly represented. Infection has even taken place in a carpenter, a steam fitter, and a stationary engineer, all of whom worked in tanneries, and in a customhouse official who weighed hides and wool on the docks. In some nonoccupational cases the disease has been spread by insects and by pet animals which had been feed- ing on diseased carcasses, and during the war period the necessary shaving brush appears to have lost its harmlessness and to have caused an alarming number of cases, in military as well as in civil life. The bacillus of anthrax is one of the largest and most easily recog- nized of disease-producing organisms, and its discovery about the middle of the last century marks the beginning of modern bacteri- ology. The bacillus, however, is not so much to be feared as a cause of disease as the spore, which is so resistant that it is used as a test object for standardizing germicides. The spore can survive for as long as IT years without nutriment, is easily carried about, and when provided with a favorable environment rapidly germinates and sets up a focus of infection. In man contagion commonly occurs through an abrasion of the skin, resulting in the so-called “ malignant pustule ” or in “ malig- nant edema/1 Woolsorter’s disease, or pulmonary anthrax, is a less frequent but almost invariably fatal form of the malady, caused by inhaling dust or particles of hair or wool from diseased animals. In rare cases the spores find entrance to the digestive system and produce a gastrointestinal attack. The method of treatment most frequently used hitherto is excision of the pustule where possible, sometimes supplemented by intravenous injections of antianthrax serum. Now, however, some successful physicians are advocating for external cases nothing more drastic than rest for the affected part, stimulants, and local treatment with iodine and wet bichloride of mercury dressings. Often in internal cases, physicians admit, the disease fails to be diagnosed and its discovery is a “ surprise of the autopsy.” In Europe both private and public forces have combined to carry on an energetic campaign against industrial anthrax. The Anthrax Investigation Board for Bradford and District, in England, the German and the French employers’ mutual trade associations, and the famous Labor Clinic at Milan, Italy, have all made valuable studies of the disease and assisted in establishing preventive meas- ures. The governments of the leading countries long ago drafted and secured the careful enforcement of sanitary rules for the dangerous