Ptomaïnes and leucomaïnes, and bacterial proteids, or the chemical factors in the causation of disease / By Victor C. Vaughan ... and Frederick G. Novy.

  • Vaughan, Victor C. (Victor Clarence), 1851-1929.
Date:
1891
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Ptomaïnes and leucomaïnes, and bacterial proteids, or the chemical factors in the causation of disease / By Victor C. Vaughan ... and Frederick G. Novy. 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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    Further inquiry revealed the fact that all who had been taken ill had used rnilk in greater or less quantities, aud that persons who had not partaken of milk escaped entirely; corroborative of this, it was ascertained that those who had used milk to the exclusion of all other food were violently ill. This was prominently noticed in the cases of infants fed from the bottle, when nothing but un- cooked milk was used. In one case an adult drank about a quart of the milk, and was almost immediately seized with violent vomiting followed by diarrhoea, and this by collapse. Suffice it to say, that we were able to eliminate all other articles of food and to decide that the milk was the sole cause of the outbreak. Having been able to determine this, the next step was to discover why that article should, in these cases, cause so serious a form of sickness. The probable causes which we were to investigate were outlined as follows : (1) Some chemical substance, such as borax, boric acid, salicylic acid, sodium bicarbonate, sodium sulphate, added to preserve the milk or to correct acidity. (2) The use of polluted water as an adulterant. (3) Some poisonous material accidentally present in the milk. (4) The use of milk from diseased cattle. (5) Improper feeding of the cattle. (6) The improper care of the milk. (7) The development in the milk of some ferment or ptomaine, such as tyrotoxicon. At the time of the first outbreak we were unable, un- fortunately, to obtain any of the noxious milk, as that un- consumed had been destroyed; but at the second outbreak a liberal quautity was procured. It was soon ascertained that one dealer had supplied all the milk used at the three hotels where the cases of sickness had occurred. His name and address having been obtained, the next step in the investigation was to inspect all the farms, and the cattle thereon, from which the milk was taken. We also learned that two deliveries at the hotels were made daily, one in the morning and one in the evening; that the milk supplied at night was the sole cause of the sickness, and that the milk from but one of