Tuberculosis (International Congress of 1905) : copy of report of C. Theodore Williams ... and H. Timbrell Bulstrode ... the delegates of His Majesty's Government to the International Congress on Tuberculosis, held at Paris from the 2nd to the 7th October, 1905 / presented to both Houses of Parliament by command of His Majesty.

  • Williams, Charles Theodore, 1838-1912.
Date:
1906
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Tuberculosis (International Congress of 1905) : copy of report of C. Theodore Williams ... and H. Timbrell Bulstrode ... the delegates of His Majesty's Government to the International Congress on Tuberculosis, held at Paris from the 2nd to the 7th October, 1905 / presented to both Houses of Parliament by command of His Majesty. 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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    G different species, a conclusion which, if accepted, at once indicates the desirability of preventive measures being extended to bovine animals affected by tuberculosis. Indeed, the only question which is left over for subsequent determination would appear to be that as to the degree of facility with with which bovine tuberculosis can be transmitted to the human organism, and as to this we shall doubtless learn more when the final report of our own Royal Commission on Tuberculosis is issued. The transactions, too, of the Congress will, when published, contain papers of very great importance in relation to this subject. It will be seen subsequently in this report that the papers read before the Congress * and the resolutions passed thereat insisted upon the necessity of taking adequate pre- cautions against the conveyance of bovine tuberculosis to the human being. In connection with this subject some highly instructive specimens were shown by Drs. Calmette and Gervais, of the Pasteur Institute at Lille, who have worked very largely with the goat as the experimental animal, this animal having been selected on account of its well-known resistant powers to the tubercle bacillus. One of the results of their researches is to show that when adult goats were fed by means of an oesophageal tube with fresh bovine tuberculous material finely triturated and diluted with a small quantity of sterile water, they con- tracted a severe pulmonary tuberculosis which was rapidly fatal, the animals showing after death no intestinal tuberculous lesions. These series of experiments also showed, in so far as young goats are concerned, that—contrary to the views of Dr. Behring in relation to the human subject—adult goats contract pulmon- ary tuberculosis more easily by the intestines than do young goats. The whole of this evidence indicates, say the experimenters, that the role of the inhalation of dust in the spread of tubercu- losis has been obviously exaggerated and that dust containing tubercle bacilli is infective not by reason of its being breathed but by reason of its being swallowed, and the lesson which they draw from their researches is that the tuberculous subject must be taught to expectorate his sputum and never to swallow it. Obviously, however, the experiments in question have an influence more far-reaching than this upon the question of the source of pulmonary tuberculosis, and we shall in Sections I. and III. refer to other considerations in connection with the matter Dr. Lydia Rabinowitsch and Dr. Max Koch, of the Pathological Institute of Berlin University, exhibited numerous specimens illustrating casual and experimental tuberculosis of birds pre- senting lesions in the bones, liver, intestine, lungs, and other organs. In another part of the museum there were illustrations and models of sanatoria both in France and other countries, and * See Section I., pages 15 and 1G and Section III., page 21.