poisonedo At 11:00 a„mo, August 8, three natives, two adult males and one 

 adult female ate some of the fish„ Early the next evenings they became ill 

 with symptoms of nausea, vomiting, end diarrhea. One male apparently 

 recovered the next day„ In the late afternoon of the 9th, Dr. Snyder was 

 called in to see the other two patients, both of whom were quite illo He 

 treated them symptomatica lly„ A specimen of the feces was obtained from one 

 of the male patients and a sample of the barracuda was obtained from a raw 

 piece of flesh that had been thrown into a chicken run„ The female patient 

 was able to get up on the morning of August 10 and the male on August 11,, 

 All traces of the patients were lost after August 11 since they promptly 

 disappeared. It is impossible, therefore, to determine whether or not they 

 had any of the residual symptoms associated with fish poisoning » 



Bacteriological examination of the fecal sample failed to show any 

 organisms of the enteric group of pathogens „ The barracuda sample was not 

 suitable for bacteriological examination since it had been found in a chicken 

 run, nevertheless it was examined „ Plating the material on differential agar 

 media showed negative for enteric pathogens,, The sample contained an 

 excessive number of bacteria „ Tryptone glucose extract agar plates were 

 overgrown and impossible to count » The dilution of sample used was not great 

 enough to permit an accurate bacterial count o The flesh contained a minimum 

 probable number of 16,000 Coliform bacteria per gram. However, none of these 

 particular data is regarded as significant since the sample available was 

 exposed to considerable contamination prior to examination,. For the 

 toxicological tests a saline extract of the raw muscle was prepared in 

 accordance with the procedure described in the foregoing discussion,, One 

 milliliter of this extract was injected intra per it oneally in each of a 

 series of three mice,, The results are shown in detail as follows % 



Mouse Number Amount of Inoculum Time of Inoculation React ion V 



1/ Immediately after being injected the mice hunched their bodies and 

 ~ appeared to have cramps in their abdomens » They dragged their hind 



quarters trying to walk. Ten minutes later they appeared normal,, Half 

 an hour later, however, they started to develop a rocking, rolling gait, 

 resembling a drunken person with a progressive paralysis of the hind 

 quarters o This paralysis became worse until death ensued „ 



Some of the extract was then heated at 80° Co for ^ hour and 

 another series of 3 mice was each injected intraperitoneally with 1 ml of 

 the heated extract „ 



18 



