No. 6. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 323 



at length (he reported iustances of infection through the digestive 

 tract following the use of food products from tuberculous cattle. 

 Most of these of necessity lack precision, a«id are not absolutely 

 demonstrative, though some of them have, as Nocai'd has said, "al- 

 most the value of an experiment." 



The well-known observations of Stang,^" Demme,^" Gosse^° and Olli- 

 vier^^ leave little doubt of the power of the bovine tubercle bacillus to 

 infect man through the digestive tract. 



Statistical Evidence. — The evidence derived from the statistics of 

 tuberculosis on this point is purely circumstantial, yet of such 

 strength as to be most convinclsig. The compilations of Dr. Tatham 

 bring out most strikingly the fact that in early life some potent fac- 

 tor is at work in causing tuberculosis. In the Harben Lectures for 

 1898, Sir Richard Thorne speaks of this as follows: "So also, if you 

 will compare the rates in Tables A B and C and contrast the 

 reduction of 27.9 per cent, which has taken place, under five years of 

 age, during the last forty-five years in all forms of tubercular dis- 

 ease, and that of 66 per cent, in phthisis, with the corresponding one 

 from tabes mesenterica, which only reached 3.0 per cent, you will 

 see that in considering the latter cause of death w^e are dealing with 



a totally different state of affairs. 



"The matter, too, assumes a still more serious aspect if we limit 

 ourselves to the first 3^ear of life, when milk is most largely used 

 as food; for then we find that the reductions in the rate of death from 

 the various forms of tuberculosis, which reduction has been going on 

 at 'all ages' for about half a century, not only disappears, but is 

 actually transformed into a large increase, reaching no less than 27.7 

 per cent. This in itself is grave enough, but its significance is still 

 further emphasized when we remember what are the circumstances 

 under which this increase in the rate of death from tabes mesenterica 

 has gone on synchronously with a decrease in that from other forms 

 of tuberculosis." 



Evidence of a similar nature is given by Dr. Still,^^ of the Great 

 Ormond Street Hospital for Children, in his analysis of 769 consecu- 

 tive autopsies of children under twelve years of age, 269 of which 

 showed tuberculous lesions. Of these, 117, or 43.5 per cent, were in 

 children under two years old, while in the first three years of life 

 56.5 per cent, or more than a half of the total number, occurred. 

 From his study of the lesions in these cases Dr. Still believes that 

 in 153, or 56.8 per cent, the respiratory tract was the channel of in- 

 fection, while in 63, or 23.4 per cent, the alimentary canal was re- 

 sponsible, the remaining fifty-three cases being uncertain or were 

 otherwise accounted for. Accepting these figures as given, they in- 

 dicate strongly that milk, the most largely used food, has a considera- 

 ble part in the spread of tuberculosis, and justify the conclusion 

 quoted from a report made to the council of the British Medical 



