BACTERIA OF MASTITIS IN COWS 487 



CATTLE DISEASES TRANSMISSIBLE THROUGH MILK. 



Foot-and-Mouth Disease. In addition to tuberculosis a number of 

 other diseases of cattle may be transmitted through the milk to man. 

 Some of these affections are due to bacteria, others are due to a 

 filterable, invisible living virus. Among the latter, foot-and-mouth 

 disease is of importance. It is transmissible from afflicted animals 

 to man through raw milk, buttermilk, butter, cheese, and whey. Man, 

 however, does not seem very susceptible to the virus because in 

 European countries the affection often occurs in widespread epidemics 

 among cattle, yet cases in man are rare. The disease in man may 

 take a light, a serious, or even a fatal form. According to Busenius 

 and Siegel, 172 cases of hoof-and-mouth disease infection occurred 

 in man from 1886 to 1896, of which 66 could be traced to milk and 

 1 to butter. A few cases transmitted through butter and 1 case 

 conveyed by soft cheese were reported after 1896. It has also been 

 proved by a number of experiments that the disease, after it has 

 been transmitted to man can be retransferred to cattle. 



Anthrax. It has been shown by Bollinger, Feser, Nocard, Mc- 

 Fadyean and others that the milk of cows suffering from anthrax 

 may contain anthrax bacilli. Cows sick with anthrax, however, 

 generally soon go dry; yet anthrax bacilli may occasionally be trans- 

 ferred through milk. Karlinski has reported the case of a patient 

 convalescent from typhoid fever who drank a quart and a half of 

 milk brought by a visitor. The patient shortly afterward became 

 very sick again; anthrax bacilli were found in his feces, and he died 

 after one month, as the postmortem showed, from the intestinal 

 form of anthrax. It was also shown that the cow which had furnished 

 the milk had, in the meantime, died from anthrax. Bonhoff, in the 

 examination of 39 samples of butter, once accidentally found anthrax 

 bacilli. These reports show that milk and milk products may 

 occasionally, though very rarely, contain virulent anthrax bacilli. 



Enteritis in Cows. Bacilli of the colon-paratyphoid group, causing 

 enteritis in cows, may occasionally lead to intestinal disturbances in 

 man. Gaffky has reported a case where the milk of a cow suffering 

 from hemorrhagic enteritis caused such disturbances in three persons. 

 Klein observed an epidemic of diarrhea in London which he thought 

 was due to the Bacillus enteritidis sporogenes infecting cow's milk 

 from the feces of these animals, but Hewlett and Barton, who found 

 this bacillus in 60 per cent, of the samples of London market milk 

 examined for this reason consider Klein's claim as entirely unfounded. 



Trembles and Malta Fever. The transmission of trembles, or milk 

 sickness, from cows to man and of Malta fever from goats to man 

 have been discussed in Chapters XXXII and XXXIV. 



Bacteria of Mastitis in Cows. The bacteriology of inflammation and 

 suppuration of the udder in cows (bovine mastitis) is quite fully 



