Tuberculosis. 139 



hurtful or even fatal to certain members of the human race is not 

 for a moment considered. 



Hence we are met by the most elaborate arguments that tuber- 

 cle is rare in the muscular system of cattle, and that muscle juice 

 is inimical to the bacillus and that therefore the muscular tissue 

 which forms the great mass of the dressed carcass may, as a rule, 

 be safely eaten even though the internal organs may have been 

 affected by tubercle. In Germany and other European countries 

 the flesh of animals in which the tubercles are found in only one 

 organ or in two related ones, is passed as wholesome. It is only 

 when the tubercles are found in the bones, or muscles, or in the 

 lymphatic glands among these, or finally when the tubercles are 

 so generally distributed in different parts of the body that it is 

 evident that the bacilli must have been carried by the blood, that 

 the meat is rejected as unfit for human food. So with milk and 

 other dairy products ; many claim with Nocard and Mc Fadyean 

 that the milk is harmless so long as the udder is quite free from 

 tubercle, and that it is only when tubercle is unmistakably present 

 in that gland that this secretion is to be feared. Apart altogether 

 from these discussions as to the wholesomeness of uncooked 

 flesh and milk it is safe to say that up to the present, every writer 

 on the subject holds that ev^n the infecting tuberculous meat and 

 milk is rendered absolutely harmless by cooking. The consensus 

 of professional opinion on this subject is tersely given by Salmon 

 and Smith in their article on tuberculosis in the work on the 

 "Diseases of Cattle" published by the Bureau of Animal In- 

 dustry — " Fortunately tubercle bacilli are readily destroyed by 

 the temperature of boiling water, and hence both meat and milk 

 are made entirel)^ safe, the former by the various processes of 

 cooking ; the latter by boiling for a few minutes." 



But this is altogether too narrow a view to take of the subject, 

 and it is liable to lead to most serious and fatal results if put into 

 every-day practice. The professional mind, in concentrating its 

 attention on tubercular infectio7i, has practically entirely over- 

 looked the no less real and, in many cases, no less dangerous fact 

 of tubercular pohoning. To elucidate this matter let us consider 

 that much of the poisonous matter produced by the growth of the 

 tubercle bacillus is retained in Koch's "tuberculin," which has 

 been absolutely sterilized. What, then, is the action of " tuber- 



