ANIMAL EXPERIMENTATION 57 



toxin days, two thirds of the croup cases that were tuhed died at this 

 hospital ; now three quarters are saved. It is hard to realize what such 

 figures actually mean. In the years preceding the discovery of the 

 germ that causes diphtheria and the working out of its antidote, among 

 the cases reported as dying from diphtheria, more than 75 per cent, 

 were attributed to diphtheria of the windpipe. 



Antitoxin, when early and properly given, will not only cure in a 

 majority of cases but likewise immunize those closely exposed to the 

 infection of the disease. Over 35,000 cases were thus treated by the 

 New York Board of Health without any serious sequel. 



Ceeebro-Spinal Meningitis 



One of the most fatal and distressing diseases, confined largely to 

 children, is epidemic and sporadic cerebro-spinal meningitis. Before 

 the working out of the anti-meningitis serum by careful, scientific ex- 

 perimentation on animals, there was no method of preventing the growth, 

 and appalling effects of the meningococci that caused the disease. Now 

 we have a serum that not only directly destroys or inhibits the growth 

 of the germs, but also indirectly acts by stimulating the white blood cells 

 to overcome the germs. At the same time a neutralizing action is ex- 

 erted on the soluble and diffusible poisons that are secreted by the 

 deadly meningococci. As a result, not only has the mortality been 

 greatly lowered, but the severe symptoms and crippling complications 

 have been most favorably influenced. The lowest mortality before the 

 serum treatment ran from about 50 per cent, in sporadic cases to 75 

 per cent, in the epidemic form in different parts of the world. When 

 the serum is now given by spinal puncture, the mortality drops to 

 about 25 per cent, or even lower. If the serum is given early in the 

 disease, the altered mortality is still more remarkable. The following 

 table quoted by Dunn from the studies of Dopter shows this feature : 



Mortality in Epidemic Meningitis under Serum Treatment 



Cases Analysed According to Period of Injection 



Flexner, Netter, Dopter, 



Per Cent. Per Cent, Per Cent, 



First to third day 14.9 7.14 8.2 



Fourth to seventh day 22.0 11.1 14.4 



Later than seventh day 36.4 23.5 24.1 



In cases that recover, the serum treatment not only shortens the dur- 

 ation of the disease — sometimes by several weeks — but lessens the 

 chances of the terribly destructive sequelae, such as hydrocephalus, blind- 

 ness and deafness. 



