SEVENTEENTH ANNUAL YEAR BOOK— PART IX 489 



The following- number of cases were investigated during the pe- 

 riod between July 1, 1914, and June 30, 1916 : : 



Actinomycosis 1 Measles 4 



Blacklee 3 Rabies 25 



f't , 01 Scabies (cattle) 4 



♦Cholera ^1 Scabies (sheep) 45 



Coital exanthema 48 Stomatitis 1 



Forage poison 22 Pneumonia 4 



Hemorrhagic septicaemia 36 Tuberculosis 414 



Glanders 24 Necro-bacillosis 1 



Mange (horses) 4 



Miscellaneous 52 Total 715 



*Does not include eradication work done in Clay, Dallas, Clinton, Muscatine 

 and Scott Counties, nor many investigations where no contagious or infectious 

 disease was found to exist. 



OUTBREAK OF FOOT AND MOUTH DISEASE IN 1914-15. 



Foot and mouth disease has appeared in the United States on 

 six different occasions— 1870, 1880, 1884, 1902, 1908 and 1914. The 

 widespread outbreak of 1914-15 Avas the most serious and extensive 

 that has occurred in this country. The previous outbreaks were lim- 

 ited to comparatively small areas and did not appear farther west 

 than the state of Michigan. The last outbreak was discovered in 

 the state of Michigan, near Niles, in October, 1914, and it had evi- 

 dently existed there since the latter part of the previous August. Its 

 source has never been definitely determined and actual proof will 

 probably never be obtained, although the infection was undoubtedly 

 introduced in some way from abroad. 



On September 3, 1914, the state veterinarian of Michigan, together 

 with a veterinary inspector of the Bureau of Animal Industry from 

 the Detroit station and two local practitioners inspected the two 

 infected herds near Niles, but failed to recognize foot and mouth 

 disease because of its mild type at that time, its slow progress 

 through the infected herds, its disinclination to spread quickly to 

 adjacent herds, the absence of vesicles which are the character- 

 istic lesions of the disease, the absence of any history of vesicles, the 

 advanced age of the lesions, the presence of lesions due to secondary 

 invasion of other infections, the resemblance of the lesions to necro- 

 tic stomatitis, and the prevalence of mycotic and necrotic stomatitis 

 in Michigan and other states at that season of the year. 



A few scrapings, consisting of saliva, scabs, pus, and bits of ne- 

 crotic tissue, forwarded to the pathological laboratory of the Bureau 

 of Animal Industry at Washington by the assistant veterinary in- 

 spector, apparently were characteristic of a fonn of stomatitis, but 

 arrived in such a condition as to render it impossible to make a diag- 

 nosis of foot and mouth disease from this material. 



