state Dairy Association. 93 



The carcasses of those in which the disease has spread from one 

 organ to another are condemned by the meat inspectors and thrown 

 into the rendering tank and made into fertilizer. It is questionable 

 whether or not, if this were generally known, the practice would be 

 tolerated by the public, yet according to the best authorities this 

 practice is a safe one. It does seem that if cows which have re- 

 acted to the test were properly branded and marked and sold as 

 diseased with tuberculosis and given an especially close inspection 

 at the time of slaughter, it might be possible to dispose of them by 

 sending them to the public markets. It is now the practice of those 

 who have tuberculous herds to ship all animals that become ad- 

 vanced with the disease to the public markets for slaughter. 

 These animals are sold without any warning to anyone, and the 

 public is protected from their use as food only by the meat in- 

 spectors. Compared with this practice, the one of sending re- 

 acting cows duly marked to the market to be slaughtered would 

 be a very safe one indeed. On the general principle that the sup- 

 pression of the contagious disease is for the public welfare, the 

 public should willingly bear at least a part of the loss when ani- 

 mals are condemned. Horses affected with glanders are now con- 

 demned and killed and an allowance to the owner is made by the 

 State. The same law does not apply to cows affected with tuber- 

 culosis, but it might be well for the dairymen to ask the Legis- 

 lature to extend the provisions of the law to cover tuberculous 

 cattle. This provision is justly due the dairymen, and I am satis- 

 fied that any organized effort to secure it would prove successful. 



Another problem worthy of consideration in dealing with 

 tuberculosis, but one very favorable to the cattle owners, is the 

 possibility of immunizing young cattle against this disease. The 

 great von Behring, who discovered diphtheria anti-toxin, which 

 has saved so many lives from diphtheria, has led the way in im- 

 munizing cattle against tuberculosis. Other able men are at work 

 on the subject, and it is only a question of time until the successful 

 immunization of cattle against tuberculosis promises to be an ac- 

 complished fact. This is a thing which the owners of registered 

 dairy cattle and valuable strains of milk stock may well take into 

 consideration in planning for the eradication of tuberculosis. 



Summing the matter up, we find that the business end of it 

 consists in the dairymen finding out, first, which cattle are tuber- 

 culous, and second, some satisfactory arrangement for disposing 

 of them. The first question has practically been settled by the 

 offer of the State Veterinary Department to make a test of all 



