576 Trausactious. — Miscellaneous. 



fectious dibease is such as to warrant the adoption of the 

 strictest regulations necessary co insure a pure milk-supply. 

 Of course, all cases of infectious disease do not originate in 

 the milk-supply — probably only a small proportion of them ; 

 but the repression is urgently required of any factor in main- 

 taining such a death-rate from infectious disease as at present 

 prevails. The deaths from such diseases do not form the 

 whole of their evil results : the temporary illness and suffering 

 of those that recover and the permanent injury done to 

 numbers of them must also be taken into account. 



Infectious diseases, it must now be allowed, are probably 

 all due to specific germs. Some of them have been absolutely 

 proved due to the presence of a special kind of germ in the 

 body. The evidence in the cases of the other fevers; so far as 

 it goes, makes the theory very probably true as regards them. 

 One kind of germ causes one special fever and no other. The 

 germ of scarlet fever is quite distinct from that causing 

 typhoid or any other infectious disease. This is what is 

 meant by saying that each infectious disease is due to a 

 specific germ. - 



In order for a man to be infected w'ith any infectious 

 fever the specific germ of that fever must be introduced into 

 his system ; and when milk is the vehicle of infection the milk 

 the individual takes must contain the specific germ. Now, 

 many germs placed in milk find in it all that they require to 

 thrive and propagate their kind. Just as in good ground weeds 

 thrive and multiply because they are in circumstances favour- 

 able for their nourishment and growth, so germs find in milk 

 a first-class soil, and multiply at an amazing rate. In a few 

 hours from the introduction of a germ or two the whole of the 

 milk is swarming with them. We can thus understand how 

 one or two specific germs finding access to a large quantity of 

 milk are able to cause disease in many individuals. The fact 

 that in many dairies the milk from all the cows is mixed, and 

 that in milk-shops the milk from different farms is not always 

 kept distinct, adds to the danger of spreading disease. Of 

 course, when milk from different sources is mixed, the infect- 

 ing germs, if present in only one of the mixed lots, are not so 

 abundant in the same quantity of milk immediately after 

 mixing, but the whole being now infected the germs may go 

 on multiplying in it. To cause disease, however, it is not 

 necessary for a large number of the disease-causing germs to 

 be swallowed, for one or two getting access to the body are 

 capable of soon becoming many under certain circumstances. 

 They multiply within the body. 



The principal infectious diseases, epidemics of which have 

 been traced to originate in the milk-supply, are typhoid fever, 

 scarlet fever, and diphtheria. 



