42 Proceedings of Indiana Academy of Science 



Kitasato and von Behring used tetanus and later diphtheria toxin 

 to protect against the respective diseases. They further discovered that 

 the blood serum of an animal actively immune against the diphtheria 

 toxin would in turn protect (passively) other animals against fatal 

 results. This is the basis of our present day antitoxic treatment which 

 von Behring 1893 first introduced for human use. Roux, '94, used the 

 horse to produce antitoxin on a large scale. 



A practical application of determining the susceptibility of a person 

 to diphtheria was made quite recently by Schick. In a susceptible person 

 a local irritation ensues upon the injection of a small amount of diph- 

 theria toxin. In the case of a positive Schick test the individual should 

 be immunized either with antitoxin (passively) or with mixtures of 

 harmless toxin-antitoxin (actively). 



Innumerable attempts have been made to apply this means to pro- 

 tect against various other diseases. The anti-bacterial sera of which 

 anti-meningococci of Flexner and anti-pneumonic which have proved 

 to be helpful in certain types of these diseases are also available. 



Recently Roux, the successor of Pasteur and at present director 

 of the Pasteur Institute, Nicholle and Conseille have developed a sero- 

 vaccination for pi'otection against measles. The serum is drawn from 

 the convalescent between the sixth and tenth day after the subsidence 

 of the fever. 



These scientists recommend, in view of the fact that the immunity 

 lasts but a short time, that one day after the child receives the inocula- 

 tion an injection of blood serum (infective) drawn from a person sick 

 (fever) with measles be made. This confers not only a longer but a 

 higher degree of immunity. It has been conservatively estimated that 

 "tens of thousands" of children have been saved from measles by this 

 procedure. 



Haffkine, '92, in the Hamburg cholera epidemic, vaccinated with 

 living spirilla attenuated by long culture and later introduced it into 

 India on a large scale. 



A few years later ('96), Kohle introduced prophylactic vaccination 

 against cholera by using cultures killed by heat or by chemicals. 



This work led Wright to try out a typhoid vaccine. It was quite 

 unsuccessful in the Boer war and it was dropped in the British army. 

 Then Leishman also of the British army took up the work. Soldiers 

 were treated and men in the same company living under similar con- 

 ditions were used as controls. The results were quite conclusive. 



After our bitter experience in the Spanish-American war, our 

 army board took up the matter. During the Texas manoevures in 1909 

 hardly a case of typhoid fever resulted and the treatment was extended 

 to the entire army with marvelous results. 



Today we can positively say that typhoid fever is a disease that 

 need not exist and can be avoided by simply applying our knowledge 

 of how it is transmitted (water and milk borne) and by vaccination. 



The same treatment was applied by Shiga, '98, to dysentery with 

 success. 



Wright urged vaccines for all germs and as we know the idea has 



